BEDA plans to protest
A trade body is considering lodging an official complaint about test purchase operations on the grounds that they are not a good use of public money.
It was also revealed that the festive sting campaign is set to continue through January.
Bar, Entertainment & Dance Association (BEDA) members are set to discuss making a complaint to the Public Accounts Committee, which scrutinises the spending of Government departments, at a meeting later this month.
The Home Office had a budget of £2.5m for its Christmas clampdown on alcohol disorder. This included £350,000 for trading standards to fund 5,500 sting operations.
'I think it has started to get to the point where we question if this is the right way to spend public money,' said BEDA chief executive Jon Collins.
'We've traded through the busiest period of the year. To then extend [test purchasing] to the quietest time of the year makes no sense at all.'
Meanwhile, children could soon be advised to lie about their age during sting operations at pubs.
Senior voices in Government, the police and the courts have already indicated that they favour the move, as local government co-ordinator LACORS prepares to redraft its guidelines on test purchases.
The current guide says children should not lie if they are asked their age in a sting operation.
But Liverpool City Council recently became the first to openly break the guidelines, after consulting with the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), the Crown Prosecution Service and Merseyside Police.
The Home Office is believed to back a change in guidelines to encourage children to lie in sting operations if the council thinks it is needed.
Federation of Licensed Victuallers Associations chief executive Tony Payne said: 'Surely the local authority should be prosecuted for encouraging people to lie.'
LACORS aims to release the new guidelines by the end of March after consultation with councils, Government, ACPO, trade bodies and others.
