Agenda item

Report of the Director of Markets and Consumer Protection.

The Committee considered a report of the Director of Markets and Consumer Protection looking at the second year of operation and details of the number of premises that are paying the Levy, the income collected and how that money has been spent to date.

The Licensing Manager reminded the Committee that they had considered a similar report last year. He drew Member’s attention to the Levy income (£296,000) and expenditure (£237,000) forecasts to the end of March 2017 as detailed in the report. This equated to an under spend of approximately £60,000. Part of this (around £20,000-30,000) was attributable to the fact that the planned Alcohol Recovery Unit planned for the 2016 festive period had not been established by the London Ambulance Service although it was hoped that this could be revisited for 2017.

The Licensing Manager went on to highlight that details of the City of London Police’s Levy expenditure was detailed in the appendix to the report.

The Licensing Manager highlighted that it was now recommended that future annual reports now also provide Members with some detailed, statistical, information on the effects of Levy spending to enable the Committee to make decisions regarding any future spend based on this.

The City of London Police stated that additional Levy funds had been extremely useful to them in terms of being able to provide additional resources at key times.

The Deputy Chairman reported that she had received much feedback to suggest that levy funding that had been utilised for additional street cleansing had offered a lot of comfort to businesses and residents in key, night time economy, areas within the City. She went on to refer to an initiative in Clapham known as the ‘Clapham Hub’ which operated from a Methodist Church every Friday and Saturday evening and was staffed by volunteers and the London Ambulance Service to offer a ‘safe’ place and basic medical treatment to those who were injured, drunk or had found themselves separated from their group of friends. She questioned whether there might be scope for a similar venture in the Bishopsgate/Liverpool Street area at key times. The City of London Police undertook to look into this and report back.

RESOLVED – That, Members:

1.     Agree that expenditure of the Levy continue in the areas set out in paragraph 15 with continued exploration into areas where the night time economy, within the scope of paragraph 13, may benefit from use of Levy income;

2.     Agree that the final allocation of the Levy, apportioned for use by the City Corporation, is to be decided by the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of the Licensing Committee in consultation with the Director of Markets and Consumer Protection; and

3.     Require that Officers prepare an annual account of the operation and effect of the Levy which is to be reported to the Licensing Committee.