I'm not surprised people think that there's going to be 24-hour boozing having read the hilarious rubbish that's been published in the national press ever since licensing reform was announced. In the main, there won't be more than the desired couple of hours expressed in one of the posts. If you want to read Wandsworth's guidance it's on their website www.wandsworth.gov.uk and it's not that onerous to dredge through (although I say that as someone who's had to read a lot of boring legislative documents though!!!) As opposed to what the Daily Mail, and to be honest Wandsworth, wants you to believe the idea behind licensing reform is flexible licensing hours to stagger closing times and ease pressure on the transport and policing infrastructure - not 24-hour party people-like scenes! I wrote to the leader of the council's office two weeks ago to object to the misinformation that is consistently peddled by Wandsworth about the new laws which merely fuels the concerns of residents that there will be drunken idiots rampaging the streets at all hours and that's simply not going to be the case. It should, in theory, stamp out binge drinking and, if the trade fails to take responsibility for controlling alcohol sales and abuse then they will be facing stringent new policy including paid-for policing and new powers to the police to shut premises down in 2007. In other words they've got two years to get their house in order. What makes me laugh is that the responsibility has been taken away from Magistrates and handed to local authorities in the hope that they will be more in touch with their local constituents than those who sit on the bench and all Wandsworth has sought to do since the announcement of the licensing reform is scaremonger and political point score. Headlines on press releases like "Twenty four hour drinking outlawed" as issued in early January by Wandsworth's press office are just rubbish. The legislation was never designed to work in this way and the reason I know this? I've been following it in my professional capacity as a reporter in the licensed trade since the launch of the White Paper so please, trust me when I say, don't believe everything you read in the papers!

Entire Thread

Topic	Date Posted	Posted By
Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	29/01/05 20:35:00	Allen Bracchi
Re:Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	01/02/05 12:41:00	Gavin McGregor
Re:Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	01/02/05 15:04:00	Olivier Magere
Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	01/02/05 15:32:00	Melissa Cole
Re:Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	15/02/05 11:42:00	Tony Colman
Re:Re:Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	21/02/05 10:54:00	Adam Bailey
Re:Re:Re:Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	21/02/05 12:15:00	Thomas Smith
Re:Re:Re:Re:Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	11/03/05 10:59:00	Adam Bailey
Re:Do we need or wont 24 hour drinking in Putney ?	11/03/05 11:13:00	Melissa Cole

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