Law Enforcement: Training to get tough
Alcohol-related crime and disorder has a major impact on the quality of life for many people. alcohol is linked to a wide range of offences, from murder, assault, driving offences, disorderly conduct, nuisance and criminal damage through to anti-social behaviour. Public drunkenness, particularly around licensed premises at closing time, can blight entire areas. It certainly doesn't do the pub trade any favours.
What you need to know
A new Home Office programme to help train police, licensing officers and Community Safety Partnerships to use their legislative powers more effectively is being monitored closely, as the whole 24-hour drinking environment is debated once more under a government that believes current legislation is too liberal. It is now developing draft legislation with a view to rebalancing the act and giving more power to local councils to set their own provisions under the 'localism' agenda.
The new programme, which will involve action in 26 areas of the country throughout 2011 and be focused on more than 500 of the most problematic premises, follows on from a successful pilot project in four locations: Newham, Newquay, Lincoln and North Nottinghamshire. Your pub could be monitored, so take note.
The action follows concerns by the government and police that officers were not using the considerable powers available to them to tackle problem premises and alcohol-related crime and disorder. Previous Home Office training events have shown that imparting skills and knowledge is just one part of the equation. The current programme is designed to address both the skills gap and a general lack of confidence among enforcement officers in using their powers.
Police trained to deal with licence breaches The training takes place over three days, with the first day consisting of a round table discussion including police, trading standards and the local authority. The session looks at all the issues of problem alcohol consumption - including underage drinking, antisocial behaviour and breaches of licence - focusing on the worst areas and individual premises in the town.
On the second day there are a series of intensive sessions with police officers, committee members and licensing professionals, which focus on the full powers that enforcement officers have. A member of the Home Office attends to answer any queries.
What grade of pub are you?
The group is asked to identify the 20 most problematic premises in its area and the Home Office team mentors officers in carrying out comprehensive licensing enforcement visits to those premises that evening. Some cities and towns have a traffic light system, pioneered in Cardiff and now adopted by other local authorities such as Bristol, where licensed premises are graded on how well they comply with the law - red premises are the offenders and these get inspected.
As well as mentoring the teams on carrying out enforcement inspections, the team also mentors delegates in taking proactive enforcement where breaches of the licensing law are identified - this can include issuing an immediate closure notice and arrests for breaches of the licensing laws.
During the pilot projects, eight pubs were closed as a result of the visits. The problems vary according to the conditions of each licence, as these are all different. Breaches identified include failure to maintain CCTV, failure to supply door staff, a lack of qualified designated premises supervisors on the premises, serving underage customers and premises failing to deal with criminality on the premises, for example drugs offences.
On the third and final day there is a detailed debrief when the training team go through any issues arising from the inspections, and provide solutions to enforcement barriers and recommendations on areas that require improvement.
The first training sessions under the new programme have already been held in Bristol and resulted in the immediate closure of three premises which were operating illegally.
In Newquay, the police and the local authority have reported a real improvement, particularly on tackling underage drinking. In Newham the council says that serious violent crime in licensed premises has gone down by more than 64 per cent, largely due to improved measures to tackle licensing breaches as a result of the Home Office training.
This country has many other questions it needs to address if it is to have a chance of changing its abusive drinking culture, but this programme is helping tackle some of the worst effects of alcohol-related crime and disorder.
Pilot project locations
The programme has already been piloted in these four locations
• Newham: the local authority was under pressure to improve the situation ahead of the London Olympics in 2012
• Newquay: the deaths of two teenagers highlighted the problems the town had with underage drinking
• Lincoln
• North Nottinghamshire
