Tragedy raises review queries

Coulson: clarification needed on the circumstances an expedited review can be used by police

The tragic events at Lava & Ignite in Nottingham, that saw a student crushed to death, hit the headlines for obvious reasons, but the aftermath raises a couple of questions for me.

The licensing committee suspended the licence at the request of the police under the expedited review system introduced to the Licensing Act back in 2007.

This can take place without the operator being present or even informed, but I have no details of what actually took place, and the tragedy clearly was uppermost in people’s minds at that time. However, such a review can only be called for when the venue is, in the opinion of a senior police officer, “associated with serious crime or serious disorder.”

This is where I have a problem. This was a panic situation, apparently, brought about by a fire alarm going off. No-one is suggesting that there was any serious crime involved, and the club had no history of this in any case. If the reason was serious disorder, again a stampede by customers on a single occasion does not, in my view, make the club ‘associated’ with what might be termed anti-social behaviour. The object of the section is to combat those alcohol-retailing venues where lax controls have led to criminal or anti-social activity related to the premises.

It seems to me that the local authority thought that it ought to do something and this seemed like a sensible precautionary measure. But this was an accident: the club has already contended that there was no overcrowding and whether or not it is subsequently hauled up for health and safety breaches of some kind is still to be determined. But that in itself does not fulfil the criteria for the issuing of an expedited review.
This is not the only example of the police using section 53A as a catch-all for premises they do not like. It is a very potent weapon and quite difficult to defend in the first instance because of the ambush nature of the procedure. Also, the interim steps have a habit of sitting around for quite a while, even if you appeal against the committee’s decision, and if this was a suspension it can virtually wipe out the business.

Clearly, given Luminar’s subsequent announcement about administration, this may not be uppermost in its mind. But there does need at some stage to clarification of exactly what circumstances can be used to justify the request for an expedited review by the police.