Police licensing team work beyond the beat

You might not spot the Wiltshire Police licensing team out on the traditional beat, but it is playing a vital role in keeping Wiltshire and Swindon a safe and healthy place to live.

Licensing officers work with partner agencies to reduce heavy drinking and prevent unlawful consumption in order to cut crime, disorder and nuisance and protect children from the harm linked to alcohol.

The team's approach involves identifying problem premises, engaging with the licence holders and offering advice.

The ultimate sanction is to review the premises at a council licensing panel and to look for conditions to be added, the removal of the designated supervisor or for the licence to be cancelled. This process can involve months of work.

In Swindon, officers have reviewed two of the main night time economy venues in the last six months and it has meant submitting files of more than 400 pages.

As a result, conditions were applied to both premises, reducing hours and capacity. Recorded incidents have dropped from weekly to less than one a month.

The Swindon officers also run campaigns to reduce disorder. A recent initiative involved the use of breathalysers at the entrances to pubs and clubs.

All applications for licences and temporary event notices are reviewed, ensuring that every application promotes the licensing objectives.

Test purchase operations are very time-consuming but effective. The process involves police recruiting under-18s, usually from among police cadets and local schools and colleges.

The operation involves a minimum of two young people, four police officers and a licensing officer. About 30 locations will be tested in a night.

If the location sells alcohol to the young person Wiltshire Police will prosecute the seller and then check on the premises the next day to identify whether there are any issues and, if so, to deal with the licence holder.

Four test purchases have been run in Swindon in the last 15 months, resulting in 135 visits and about ten failures. It is rare for a venue to fail twice.

Last autumn the Swindon Licensing Team changed its strategy.

Despite its efforts some areas were seeing an increase in alcohol-related crime and anti-social behaviour (ASB).

The team strengthened links to other agencies including trading standards, Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, immigration, and the council's CCTV and ASB teams.

The evidence highlighted an increase in street drinking and ASB which led the team to focus on off licences in Swindon town centre and Broadgreen.

One agency that proved particularly effective is the immigration service which can now make representations against licence applications.

Wiltshire Police has been able to provide the immigration service with evidence concerning the employment of illegal workers at off licences and restaurants which, in turn, allows the Immigration Service to pursue the employers under the Immigration Act.

By ensuring that police share the information on licensees with immigration can result in a conviction, allowing the Force to prevent the licensee from opening licensed premises elsewhere and then the same thing happening again.

Licence reviews have had some extraordinary results. In Manchester Road the team has disrupted organised crime groups and moved them out of the area.

The licence review applications in Broadgreen are widely supported by the local community due to their concerns about alcohol-related ASB and the impact it has on the area.

Following the implementation of the Cumulative Impact Zone (CIZ) in the Broadgreen area, the licensing officers have been able to reduce the overall number of premises selling alcohol.