'Work with us on underage drinking'

An awful lot has changed in a decade when it comes to the way licensees run their pubs and co-operate with local authorities to ensure their town and city centres are pleasant places to socialise throughout the day and night.

There are more than 100 Best Bar None schemes on the go, just eight years after the first one was introduced in Manchester. In Nottingham, a licensee-led Business Improvement District has delivered a 23% reduction in public order offences in a single year. Over in Sheffield, a very close working relationship between licensees and police through Pubwatch has delivered a massive reduction in alcohol-related crime — a "no-drinking and no glass" scheme in the city centre has been integral to this.

Sometimes it's easy to forget how much levels of professionalism have improved in

just 10 years. A worthwhile reminder is the world of door supervisors. Last year Mitchells & Butlers head of security and licensing Andrew Nichols recalled watching a horrendous TV documentary about a decade ago that featured Bristol doormen dishing out summary justice.

Nichols, whose company very recently employed 1,500 doormen each weekend (the sale of 333 wet-led pubs will have reduced the head count), reports that his boss had been watching the same programme and called him straight away.

"'Do we use these people?,' is the question my boss asked me and, in all honesty, I didn't know. In those days, doorstaff were taken on an ad hoc basis.

"There were no agreed fees for door work. No standard rights for the door guys and girls and no real instructions listing what was expected of them.

"Contract information was in short supply, and there was little or no performance monitoring going on," Nichols recalled.

Unprofessional mess​

It was, in short, a bit of an unprofessional mess — and no wonder the police, local residents and others were less than happy. Now, of course, the world of door supervision is but one area where the trade has upped its game — and, with progressive partners, changed the landscape on public order.

However, there are still areas where the mindset is about catching licensees out.

One example is in relation to test-purchasing for underage drinking. I notice that such a

case in February cost the well-resourced JD Wetherspoon the ridiculous sum of £50,000 in legal fees as it fought a licence revocation (the review was withdrawn on the morning it was due to be heard).

Great strides​

The trade has made great strides in this area — but still has more to do because we score less well than the off-trade.

It's another area where a partnership approach to the problem between licensees and police will work better than sting operations — and Draconian enforcement.

Yet there is still a minority of officials who seem to think the best way to proceed is to make an example of licensees whose staff have made a mistake rather than work

co-operatively instead.