FOLLOWING your coverage of the objections to Sainsbury's licence application at Coten End in Warwick (Courier, last week), I would like to add my comments.
Last year this site was sold to developers who applied for planning permission for a mixed development of retails units with ten apartments above, with no mention of a supermarket. This was approved by the planning committee. Work commenced in Januar
y.
Sainsbury's later acquired a massive triple unit, together with an automatic 24/7 trading licence. Neither the Warwick District Council planning committee nor the public were consulted. No site notices were ever displayed. None appeared in the case file at the council offices.
Their original application for a drinks licence from 6am to midnight has since been changed to 7am to 11pm following an adjournment of the hearing of objections due to insufficient notice. The deadline for written objections is now August 20.
In the light of the national concern about binge drinking and its association with violence and street crime, and the fact that the proposed Lidl supermarket in Myton Road only recently received planning consent subject to its trading hours being confined to 8am to 9pm weekdays and 10am to 4pm on Sundays, I see no reason why Sainsbury's should be afforded special consideration.
Furthermore, I would be very concerned were the council to approve this present application, as I believe that it would indicate a marked absence of a sense of social responsibility by all parties.
Should the inevitable problems arise as a result of a late licence, the police would be powerless to act until after the event - and only if the residents complain about noise and disturbance. This then becomes an environmental health infraction, and not a police issue.
By then it is too little and too late. - John Stevens, Emscote Road, Warwick.
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