A gaming company can now open its Brighton venue 24 hours a day after it was granted a change to its licence.
Merkur Slots was granted an extension to its existing licence after a Brighton and Hove City Council licensing panel hearing for a “variation of a bingo licence” at its St James’s Street premises.
Sussex Police objected to the changes, raising concerns about customer and staff safety at a virtual hearing on Tuesday 27 June.
Merkur’s barrister Philip Kolvin said that the adult gaming centres had “low usage” and were not “thrumming casinos”.
He said: “There are concerns raised that customers might be mugged coming out of adult gaming centres. That’s not my client’s experience.
“If it were an issue in this location, it would have manifested at some point during my client’s trade until midnight.”
In granting the 24-hour licence, the panel of three councillors – Julie Cattell, Paul Nann and Kerry Pickett – added conditions. These included using a magnetic lock on the door when trading past midnight for the first six months.
The company must also ensure that two staff are scheduled to work from 10pm. All staff are required to have a copy of the risk assessment for the local area.
Should the premises be single-staffed at any time between 8pm and 6am, the magnetic door locking system must be in constant use.
The council said: “The panel considers that the material produced by the applicant and the submissions made on its behalf deal with and effectively rebut the concerns raised by the police.
“Extensive evidence was produced of the 24-hour operation of its other premises without issue in other relatively high-crime areas as well as an observation report for St James’s Street itself.
“There is no evidence of any issues associated with the 24-hour Admiral gambling premises near by which apparently has no further conditions on its licence in contrast to the proposed conditions for this application.
“Detailed evidence is provided of the way in which Merkur Slots is operated with all the various safeguards, processes and systems in place to mitigate risk.
“Overall, the panel considers that the evidence produced shows that it is unlikely that granting this application will add to crime and disorder in the area.”
Can’t honestly believe that having 24 hour gambling being a good thing for anyone especially for someone who might have problems in that direction.
Unfortunately, that is a logical fallacy. Just because someone might have problems with gambling, doesn’t mean that a gambling venue should not exist. It’s not my personal favourite thing either, but one has to respect people’s right to do what they want within the law.