Police launch shatterproof glass campaign after attack

Eldridge Pope is to start using shatterproof glasses in all its late-night venues following the blinding of a 21-year-old girl in one of its pubs.

Avon & Somerset police have launched a high-profile campaign to make shatterproof glasses compulsory following the attack on Louise McClintock in the Toad at the Warehouse in Taunton last month.

Miss McClintock has lost the sight in her right eye, prompting her father John to launch a petition to make plastic or shatterproof glasses compulsory in all venues in the Somerset town.

With 2,000 names on the petition already, Mr McClintock said: "We want to get every pub and club in Taunton to use shatterproof or plastic glasses. Then we plan to take this nationwide. I just don't want this to happen to anybody else's children."

West Country pub operator Eldridge Pope said it had reviewed its policy following the attack, and will "ensure all our pubs and bars, that operate with extended hours, carry a full range of shatterproof glasses".

The move will cover about a third of the Eldridge Pope estate, including all its Toad bars.

The company announced its move at a press conference also attended by the McClintock family, local MP Adrian Flook, and police and council representatives.

The police and Taunton Deane Council said they now plan to make it a condition of renewing public entertainment licences that venues agree to use shatterproof glasses.

Pub operators have recognised that shatterproof glasses are needed in some outlets, but do not believe they are necessary across the board.

Eldridge Pope said it "will continue to liaise with the police and the local authority and will be supportive of the final decision reached in relation to these matters".

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