Agenda and draft minutes

To receive any apologies for absence.

Apologies for absence were submitted from Councillors Morag Malvern, Mike Smith and Bill Soane.

To confirm the Minutes of the Meeting held on 23 January 2024.

The Minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 23 January 2024 were confirmed as a correct record, subject to the amendment below, and signed by the Chair.

That the following wording would added to the Licensing Policy:

New applications and renewal applications seeking licensable hours after 11pm are expected to put provisions in place for their staff working past 11pm by identifying workable solutions to facilitate safe travel home such as getting reimbursed taxi travel for late shift workers.

To receive any declarations of interest.

There were no declarations of interest.

To answer any public questions

A period of 30 minutes will be allowed for members of the public to ask questions submitted under notice.

The Council welcomes questions from members of the public about the work of this committee.

Subject to meeting certain timescales, questions can relate to general issues concerned with the work of the Committee or an item which is on the Agenda for this meeting.  For full details of the procedure for submitting questions please contact the Democratic Services Section on the numbers given below or go to www.wokingham.gov.uk/publicquestions

There were no public questions.

To answer any member questions

There were no Member questions.

To receive and consider a report giving details about the consideration of a Cumulative Impact Assessment for Remenham.

The Chairman welcomed residents of the Remenham area who were in attendance to take part in the discussions about the consideration of a Cumulative Impact Assessment (CIA) for Remenham.

Keiran Hinchliffe, Licensing Service Manager read through the report that was set out in Agenda pages 11-14.  The report set out the legislative framework and key considerations to enable the Committee make a decision on whether to proceed with a CIA for Remenham.

During the discussion of the item the following comments and questions were made:

·           If the Committee decided to proceed with a CIA, this would not impact the events taking place this year;

·           The CIA was expected to take 9-12 months to complete;

·           The CIA would take evidence from this year’s event, previous years’ data and information from SAG meetings, followed by a public consultation;

·           The findings of the CIA would be brought back to this Committee, probably in January or March 2025.  This Committee would then make recommendations based on the findings of the CIA;

·           Neil Allen, Head of Legal explained that in terms of governance, the Licensing and Appeals Committee was requested to make a decision as to whether to proceed with a CIA, at a later stage the Licensing and Appeals Committee would recommend the adoption of a Cumulative Impact Policy or not.  The Licensing and Appeals Committee would then submit its recommendation for final approval by the Council;

·           Keiran Hinchliffe explained that undertaking a CIA was a significant piece of work that would take a lot of resources.  Many other stakeholders such as the police would also be involved in this process;

·           Members asked about the cost of a CIA.  The Committee was informed that the cost was unknown.  However, there was already a lot of Officers’ involvement in the management of summer events in Remenham, so it was possible that this work could be undertaken with the resources that were already in place for those events;

·           Members wondered if implementing a CIA for Remenham was a good use of money, and were uncomfortable with the fact that the cost was unknown;

·           Kieran Hinchliffe pointed out that even if the CIA did not result in the adoption of a Cumulative Impact Policy (CIP), there could be other positive outcomes that led to improvements in different ways;

·           Members asked if the Remenham Farm Residents Association (RFRA) had been approached about contributing to the cost of the CIA?;

·           There was indication that the Parish Council was willing to enter a conversation about a financial contribution towards the cost of the CIA.

The Chairman invited the RFRA to share their views with the Committee.  Ron Emerson, Neil Brown and Michael Dudley addressed the Committee and some of the points they made are listed below:

·           The residents thanked Members for the opportunity to take part in the meeting;

·           The number of events the area had increased substantially over the years, with over 160 days of events taking place per year;

·           As well as the days when events took place,  ...  view the full minutes text for item 31.