Q
80Mr.
Campbell: But we are not talking about making a mistake.
We are talking about making repeated
mistakes. Shane
Brennan: Two
mistakes. Rob
Hayward: In relation to the 40 per cent. figure,
Vernon Coaker and his predecessors have dealt with the question of
under-age campaigns, which we have supported. The police chose specific
BCUs within the worst 1 per cent. of those with problems. In those
BCUs, the failure rates came down markedly from the worst position,
which was 40 per cent. Therefore, we are not talking about anything
like 40 per cent. We are talking about only a very small proportion of
targeted locations, selected on police intelligence, in the on-trade
and off-trade. I am not defending them. In a number cases, they were
closed or action was taken against them. We did not object to
that.
Q
81Mr.
Campbell: So you are telling me that it is a small,
diminishing
problem. Rob
Hayward: It is a diminishing problem, but I was
trying to identify where the 40 per cent. figure came
from.
Q
82Mr.
Campbell: Okay, but it is a small, diminishing problem
that we ought not to be too concerned
about. Rob
Hayward: No, I did not say that. I was absolutely
clear. You need to be concerned because people are given a licence to
sell alcohol. They accept that responsibility. I was saying that it was
a targeted
operation.
Q
83Mr.
Campbell: But even if it is targeted in those areas, it is
still a major problem when retailers in on-sales or off-sales have been
resistant to all the pressure that has been brought to bear on them to
live within the
law. Rob
Hayward: Absolutely. That is why I commented on
confiscation and the like
earlier.
The
Chairman: Are there any other colleagues trying to catch
my
eye?
Q
84James
Brokenshire: I want to come back on a couple of specific
points and then discuss a slightly broader
point. Mr.
Craik, as we discussed, to commit the offence of persistently
possessing alcohol in a public place it must take place on
three or more occasions within 12 months. What guidance has
ACPO given to police forces on the recording of this information?
Obviously
police would need to know that someone had been caught on two previous
occasions to determine whether the offence has been triggered. How will
that be recorded? Will it go on the new PentiP system or the police
national computer? What will
happen? Mike
Craik: It will go on to the force’s local
system. It is possible that if somebody wandered from Durham to my area
we would not know that they had been dealt with on one or two previous
occasions, unless the officers recognised the address and asked the
control room to call Durham. That would not happen automatically.
However, most of these cases involve local people in local areas; it is
a local issue. In reality, most cops in the neighbourhood would know
such information without looking at their database. They share
conversations with each other at briefings each day and know who is on
two strikes. They know what action is being taken and whether the
person is likely to offend or not. In my force, such information is
recorded on our system and available to all my officers. It would be
available to other forces only if they contacted us and asked. It would
not be on a national
database.
Q
85James
Brokenshire: As we discussed earlier, my concern with the
extension of the power of directions to leave to 10-year-olds is that
there are existing powers to take children back to their homes if they
are at risk or if police have concerns about their safety. In what
circumstances would you use this power for a 10 or 11-year-old rather
than take them back to a place of
safety? Mike
Craik: It applies to 10 to 15-year-olds. Officers
would make a judgment. A 10-year-old who is out in the middle of the
afternoon with other 10 or 11-year-olds might just be moved on. This is
more likely to be applied to the 15 or 14-year-olds who are out with 16
and 17-year-olds when we want to move all of them on, not just the ones
who qualify by dint of age, leaving the others
behind. It is kind of
misleading sometimes to assume that, just because some are a year or
two older that they are the dominant ones in the group. Some 13 to
14-year-olds can be difficult and can be group leaders. It is about
giving the officers the opportunity either to move them or, if there is
risk of harm, to do what they would have done anyway, which is take
them home to their parents. There is also, sadly, the reality that
taking some kids home to their parents does not work, because the
parents are not interested in the problem that the kids are causing.
There may be times when officers will seek to move them on together
with the
others.
Q
86James
Brokenshire: But what does that say in terms of child
protection issues? You are suggesting that there is a problem with the
parents and, therefore, we are just simply moving it on; surely, a
place of safety or child protection issues are involved. That is what I
am seeing in respect of this clause and it leaves me uncomfortable. Are
we saying, “If there is a young child, we simply move them
on”? Mike
Craik: That could happen, but with the 10 or
11-year-olds, depending on the time of day, what the risk is and who
they are with, in most cases—nearly all
cases—they would be taken home. However, they may come straight
out again. If that is so, they may be taken home again. We may report
them to social services and there may be some subsequent action. In the
meantime, we need something to happen now to make that issue go
away. I am not
suggesting for a moment that a child of 10 or 11 who is vulnerable
would simply be moved on to other streets with no other action being
taken. There would be either an attempt to take them home or, if that
was not successful, there would have to be follow-up action. However,
the problem with follow-up action is that it takes until the next day
or the next week and does not solve the problem there and
then. In terms of
reassuring the public, it is also about letting them see something
demonstrably being done to solve the problem on that day, as well as in
the longer term. A child such as the one we are talking about would
probably end up being subject to acceptable behaviour agreements. If
just taking them home did not work and the problem went on and on,
there would, then, potentially, be an antisocial behaviour order and
the rest of it. There
is an escalator of responses. These additional clauses enable our
officers to deal with particularly intractable, difficult situations
and give them some choice to use their
discretion.
Q
87James
Brokenshire: But principally it is the teenagers rather
than the very young children whom you would expect to be using this
power
against. Mike
Craik:
Yes.
Q
88James
Brokenshire: On the broader point, obviously there are
some partnership initiatives—or less statutory measures, if I
can describe them in those terms—being undertaken in various
parts of the country to try to reduce the harm associated with alcohol
consumption and to provide education as well. In that context, I am
thinking of the community alcohol project, based out of St. Neots and
also some ways in which businesses use business improvement districts
in consultation with local authorities. The Broadstream BID in
Birmingham, which I visited, is one example of how the night time
economy is being managed in that
manner. Would the
witnesses be prepared to comment on the impact of the code
arrangements? Do you see those helping the situation and helping
promote such partnerships or are there some risks that they will
undermine some of the good work that is starting to be done in a number
of
communities? Mr.
White, from a local authority perspective, are local authorities
engaging with partners in such ways to try to have a different
approach, rather than simply looking at law enforcement, and are they
considering longer-term interventions to try to change behaviour and
patterns of
behaviour? Chris
White: As a district councillor, I sit on a council
with one third of the licensed premises of Birmingham, which is quite a
remarkable statement, given the size of Birmingham versus St. Albans.
The approach there is for the local authority to work with the licensed
trade. It is not in the interest of the licensed trade not to work with
the local authority or vice versa.
It is much cheaper for everybody for there to be schemes such as
PubWatch and similar. Generally speaking, although individual premises
cause me difficulties as an elected member, and cause the council
difficulties, they are few and far between, given how many we are
dealing with. That has got to be the starting point of a good and,
indeed, positive approach to licensing.
The consumption of alcohol in a
calm setting is part of the British way of life and is something that
we would wish to preserve rather than ban. That is why I am nervous
about mandatory conditions. For instance, under the Licensing Act 2003,
we have the concept of the designated premises supervisor, which was
imposed on all licensed premises, including occasional users, such as
clubs and churches. That is a cost and a difficulty that has not helped
the process. There is
always a danger that something written in Whitehall will not suit a
particular pub on a corner in a particular market town or something in
the centre of Newcastle upon Tyne. Therefore, the more we deal with
local conditions set by local demands and use the representations of
local people regarding what they want, the more likely it is that we
will be
successful. Shane
Brennan: Something worries me about imposing
regulations and conditions on premises, rather than looking at
partnership alternatives. I do not think that anyone intends
partnerships to be simply the place where this should all start. We
have to ensure that partnerships are maintained. We have seen great
success, for example, in relation to the community alcohol partnership,
to which you referred, in St. Neots. That is now taking
place to a wider extent in Cambridge and other parts of the
country. Industry and
the enforcement community need to work together to look at the problems
of, in this case, under-age drinking. They need to look at all the
different levers, and they will see real results through that
partnership approach. My fear is that if people do not look at those
options first and are pushed towards imposing conditions, or burdens,
that will create the potential for a confrontational
relationship—not simply a lack of communication or partnership.
That is something we need to avoid, whatever happens with this
legislation.
Q
89James
Brokenshire: Mr. Shenker, in terms of harm
reduction and addressing some of these deep-seated issues, what are
your thoughts on partnership working and the interrelationship between
mandatory, statutory, regulatory and partnership
approaches? Don
Shenker: We have seen some good examples of voluntary
partnership working—you mentioned Birmingham and St. Neots. The
problem is that there is good practice and there is actually being
responsible. The problem with the St. Neots approach is that we do not
know how sustainable it is in the long term. It is a good approach, but
we do not know how long it will last. It requires committed buy-in from
a lot of different partners. Officials and partnerships change, and
people come and go. If
we are to try to tackle the issue of alcohol-related crime and
disorder, we need to have some minimal national standards in place by
which all licensees across the on-trade and off-trade abide. That way
we can
eradicate some of the poor practice that we have seen. In relation to
some of the price promotions that we have seen in the on-trade, for
example, people are not acting illegally when they allow people to
drink for free once they pay £5 on the door. That causes huge
problems for the police. Some local authorities are good at dealing
with those things and some are not so good. The Government need to take
some action in dealing with this. In relation to alcohol issues, crime
and disorder costs us £7 billion a year. We would save an awful
lot of lives and police time if we had some national minimum standards
on price promotions, and some national standards on training and point
of sale information. I
honestly believe that whatever the regulatory cost burden would be, it
is quite clear from the economic analysis that I have seen that there
would be an absolute economic gain in terms of the industry’s
profit margins—it would be charging more if it had a minimum
price. If loss-leading was not an issue, the industry would gain in
terms of income and the Exchequer would gain in terms of VAT.
The Government have a decision
to make. Do they want to try to tackle the problem across the board in
terms of on-trade and off-trade, or do they want to try to tinker
around the edges, as they have done with alcohol-related problems? This
is an opportunity to try to provide some national standards for
responsible practice, with which, I think, many people in industry
would agree. There is
a concern about the burden of regulation and cost. If you are in the
business of selling alcohol, you need a budget that allows you to do
that responsibly. If you do not have a budget to do it responsibly, I
am afraid you should not be in the business of selling
alcohol. Rob
Hayward: May I comment on one or two things? To pick
up on what Don said, interestingly enough the KPMG study that looked at
the whole issue of promotions—in an unsatisfactory way, as far
as we are concerned—did not find one example of a
“£5 to drink all night” or “women in
free” offer. We have actively discouraged that through our
promotions policy, which appears to have worked reasonably effectively.
As I have said, the report did not find one example of that, even
though the Home Secretary referred to it on Second Reading. We think
that there is a minimum standard, and that it is worth looking at
raising standards, in one form or another, and tackling particular
premises. The standard is that you have to get a licence in the first
place, and you have to go through a series of tests and training to
qualify for that licence.
On your original question,
Mr. Brokenshire, about impact—yes, there may well be
an impact. Mr. Ruffley, with his own company, Greene King,
in his
constituency—
Mr.
Ruffley: I wish it was my own company. I represent
it. Rob
Hayward: Or Ms Keeble in Northampton—they will
know what the companies that work in their towns and cities do to help
communities.
Q
90Ms
Keeble: We have had a “women get in free”
offer.
Rob
Hayward: We have discouraged them, as I have said,
but in terms of the work of Carlsberg and Greene King, you will be very
much aware of the excellent work and projects that people fund, such as
taxi schemes and help to get home in one form or another, or the BID
schemes to which you have referred. There is a risk, and it is
important that any consideration or legislation works its way around
that so that it does not deter the excellent work that those companies
do.
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