Council ‘boycotted spiking forum over venue’ choice
BRISTOL City Council and Mayor Marvin Rees have been criticised after the council boycotted a key meeting to discuss drink spiking because it was held in a lapdancing club.
The Bristol NightWatch, a forum of the city’s bars, pubs and clubs, met last week to discuss a strategy to deal with an apparent rise in the number of incidents of people having drinks spiked.
But because the meeting took place at lapdancing club Urban Tiger – while it was closed during the day – Bristol City Council or the Mayor’s Office refused to attend.
Bristol City Council said the venue was inappropriate, given the council has just launched a consultation on the future of the city’s two sexual entertainment venues.
NightWatch meetings are held in different venues each time and representatives from the police and Bristol City Council usually attend.
Paul Stoodley, a director of the Queenshilling club, said: “This is the first time in my history of 11 years providing night-time service to the Bristol economy that the authorities have boycotted a venue on a PubWatch.
“The topic of the meeting was drink spiking and the city’s licensees came together as one to work on a new campaign to target the perpetrators of this crime to ensure people are caught and charged.”
He said: “I’m disappointed in Marvin Rees and Bristol City Council licensing, and the police, who failed to attend. I’m disgusted with the authorities’ boycott of today’s valuable meeting.”
There are two clubs with specific licences as sexual entertainment venues in Bristol, Urban Tiger and
Central Chambers. Both recently had their licences renewed, but Mayor Marvin Rees has for years stated his opposition to the presence of SEVs in Bristol, and the debate about their presence has raged for several years in the city. A month ago, Bristol City Council launched a formal consultation about whether the city should have no SEV licences given out at all – which would effectively shut down the two clubs.
Brendan Murphy, the founder of Bristol’s bar and restaurant association BARBI, described the decision by the council to boycott such an important meeting because of the venue as ‘quite pathetic.’
“It’s a real shame that such an important meeting has been boycotted by the council,” he said.
“It was the largest NightWatch event we have been involved with over the past four years, and the city’s nightclubs and licensees came together to try to have a collaborative approach to dealing with the perpetrators behind the spate
of spiking, and to make sure that all of their patrons can have a safe night out.”
Bristol City Council and the police launched their own initiative to try to tackle the issue of drink spiking this week, through a project called Bristol At Night Panel.
On Friday, a spokesperson for Bristol City Council confirmed the decision not to attend was taken because of the choice of venue.
“We asked NightWatch to move the venue for the meeting on night time safety, as there is an ongoing debate about the role SEVs play in wider safety for women and girls.”
“Urban Tiger was also an inappropriate venue to hold a meeting while the consultation on SEV licensing takes place, where we will hear all views on the venues and after which the cross-party licensing committee will take a decision. The City Centre BID team attended the meeting to give a briefing on the drink spiking campaign and answer questions as a major partner in it.
“The feedback from venues and others to the drink spiking campaign has been very positive and we thank NightWatch and all others for their support in leading the fightback against this crime.”
Avon and Somerset police have been asked for clarification on why no one from the police attended the meeting.