Dear Editor,
I followed the Save Stockbridge meeting this week on Twitter and thought I should send a letter.
I think it’s a strange request to lobby the school the school given that the Rugby Club is completely independent of the school and has been for a number of years.
I see from your tweets that they (Save Stockbridge) are still banging on about the planning permission, which is an argument they lost many months ago. It is the Licensing Board who are going on the site visit not the planning committee.
Interesting that ‘they’ turn up at the Licensing Board with 40 people all wanting to repeat pretty much the same thing yet because of that the meeting was ‘flawed’ and a shambles.
Some of the written objections came from people in Fife, the Borders and Bathgate etc and pretty much look like they were filled out on the street by passers bye.
Many had objections written in terms that might make one suspect they were told what to write e.g. ‘object to everything’ was the type of thing written on some of them.
The link between alcohol and young people is interesting, Accies already have a license for their club rooms on site so in fact as far as the club connection is concerned nothing is changing except the facilities will be much better.
The other 3 licenses are on the street side, a grocers, a restaurant and an ice cream parlour (I’m thinking Lucas’s.) These applications, even including the current licenses in Stockbridge, come nowhere near the Board’s definition of over provision.
The applicants’ solicitor did interrupt some of the 40 speakers because they started to speak about matters not in their written objection, which is against the ‘rules.’ The applicant is entitled to know the nature of the objection prior to the meeting.
Similarly, when some of the objectors tried to interrupt the solicitor representing the Accies they were informed quite forcibly that this is not allowed at a quasi judicial hearing. ‘Almost got thrown out’ is a complete exaggeration, the Accies solicitor, after being interrupted several times, said that if they interrupted her again she would ask for them to be removed. The Convenor quickly calmed things down.
This was mostly about the objectors not understanding the rules of a hearing and who is allowed to speak when.
License covers 6k only to allow spectators, in a full house, to have an alcoholic drink if they wish. The pitch isn’t in the license footprint so any ‘concert’ is extremely unviable and of course you could watch and hear anything like that from Inverleith Park for free.
The concert idea is a complete red herring to try to scare locals. If such an event was mooted then a public entertainment licence would be required for the particular event and people would have the ability to object.
Accies have offered up a licensing condition that states that at events attracting more than 1k a limit of 4 drinks per person would be imposed. If it is more than 1k then this would have to be something happening outside on the pitch because the capacity of the inside is circa 1k.
Interesting to note that the Scottish Cricket Team play home games at the Grange right next door, attracting many people to the event with an all day alcohol license and there is not a single complaint either by Police Scotland or to any of the Local Cllr’s.
Name and address supplied.
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