Agenda and minutes

RESOLVED that Councillor C. J. Spencer be appointed Chairman of the Sub-Committee for the meeting.

No apologies for absence were received.

To invite Councillors to declare any Disclosable Pecuniary Interests or Other Disclosable Interests they may have in items on the agenda, and to confirm the nature of those interests.

No declarations of interest were received.

The Sub-Committee considered an application for a Premises Licence, submitted by Mr. William Stephenson, in respect of Bibbey DC and Sons, 472 Bromsgrove Road, Romsley, Halesowen, Worcestershire, B62 0JL.

The application was subject to a Hearing in light of 7 representations received from members of the public.  The basis of their representations was on the grounds of noise nuisance, public nuisance, increase in litter and anti-social behaviour.

It was confirmed that all Members of the Sub-Committee had conducted a site visit, an unannounced visit to the site for which the application had been submitted. 

At the invitation of the Chairman, all parties present provided a brief introduction.

The Chairman asked Mr. Stephenson if he was aware that he could have had legal representation.  Mr. Stephenson confirmed that he had been made aware and was happy for the Hearing to continue.

The Technical Officer (Licensing) Worcestershire Regulatory Services (WRS), introduced the report and informed Members that the location was a farmer’s field, and that the application stated that the field would be used for an outdoor music festival and other events, as detailed in the application form. 

The Technical Officer (Licensing) WRS, drew Members’ attention to paragraph 2.4 of the report which detailed the hours being sought by the applicant for licensable activities, as follows:-

Members were further informed that a representation had been received from Environmental Health, Worcestershire Regulatory Services, one of the Responsible Authorities consulted with; who had raised concerns with regard to ‘Prevention of Public Nuisance’, as detailed at Appendix 2 to the report.

Seven representations had been received from members of the public, as detailed at Appendix 3 to the report. 

The Technical Officer (Licensing) WRS, further drew Members’ attention to paragraph 2.6 of the report which detailed that the applicant had agreed that the licence would only be used to authorise licensable activities on a maximum of 12 days per calendar year and a maximum of 4 days in any calendar month.

The Chairman then invited Mr. Stephenson and Ms. R. Ward, to put forward their case in support of the application.

Ms. Ward explained to the Members that she was the treasurer for the Ben Morse Foundation.  The Foundation was established in memory of Benjamin Morse, who had met an untimely departure at the age of 36. 

One of Ben’s passions was music, so with Ben’s passion in mind and to mark the first anniversary of his departure; a ‘BenFest’ event was organised (at a different location) in his home town of Halesowen in order to keep his memory alive. 

Following on from the huge success of the event, it was decided to continue to hold future family festivals / events; and the Foundation was formed in order to look at a two year delivery plan and to monitor and control  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4/19