Blackpool EMRO - final!

Last night Blackpool Council formally (and apparently unanimously) accepted the recommendation of the Licensing Committee not to oppose the imposition of an Early Morning Restriction Order (EMRO) on part of the town centre.  This followed a four day hearing in February which we attended on behalf of Funny Girls and its various venues, which would have been affected.  For the original Licensing Committee decision, see here.

A ‘Steering Group’ will now be set up involving the council the police and licence trade to look at alternative measures, something which the trade proposed as part of its case against the adoption of an EMRO.

Lambeth Council also recently announced that it has rejected plans for an EMRO which would have banned the sale of alcohol in four licensed premises at the junction of Wandsworth Road and North Street in Clapham between midnight and 6am; albeit it noted that there were long-term problems in the borough, the Committee were not convinced that an EMRO was “the right tool for the job”.

Will these decisions prove the ‘death knell’ for other EMROs under possible consideration or contemplation?  Time will tell.