I am anxious to see us make more progress in tackling alcohol-related anti-social behaviour in Leamington town centre late at night.  I recently met with Chief Inspector Tim Bailey and the town centre sergeant Paul Calver to discuss our plans for the future.

Many of the recent initiatives have been working well.  Many of the changes brought in by Labour’s new licensing laws have proved very helpful.  We have the town centre designated as a special zone.  Under the new laws, the police are far more involved in deciding whether licenses can be granted or not, and they also have more control over conditions granted to those licenses.  Using new powers, the police have attended over 100 licensing hearings and have made over 500 club and pub visits.  Labour’s new laws on door stewards have also helped improve the situation in our town centre.

Since police started using the new powers we have given them, incidents of anti-social behaviour in the town centre have dropped by 36%, criminal damage by 35% and all crime and disorder by 7%.

But we can do more.  Residents still suffer noise and disturbance, and there are additional steps we can take to improve the situation further.  The police are calling for the use of taxi marshals and for the closure of Bedford Street and Tavistock Street to through traffic at certain hours.  I support these ideas and I am urging Warwickshire County Council to implement the changes.

I think Warwick District Council should continue to keep a cap on the total number of pubs and clubs permitted in the special zone.  They should support and strengthen a penalty points system for licensed premises and they should not hesitate to withdraw licenses for premises which incur too many penalty points.

24 April 2008