A LEOMINSTER bar can still trade despite breaches that “undermined licensing objectives and hindered police investigations”.

Herefordshire Council’s licensing sub-committee agreed to allow the continuation of the premises licence at the Ducker Bar, formerly known as the Ducking Stool, at a review meeting last week.

The licence review into the South Street bar was carried out after police were unable to obtain CCTV recordings of incidents reported at the premises on three separate occasions between June and December last year, in breach of a licensing condition imposed in September of 2017.

Under the condition, the bar must ensure that CCTV recordings of all areas where the sale or supply of alcohol occurs must be kept available to police on demand for a period of 31 days and that an appointed member of staff must always be on site to download footage.

But, the committee heard, when police officers had first attended the Ducker following an assault at the bar in June of last year, they were told that CCTV footage of the incident had only been kept for seven days before being recorded over.

A second breach occurred in July, when police received a report that licensee Sian Rooke-Jenkins had been assaulted at the bar.

Officers said Ms Rooke-Jenkins had refused access to the CCTV at the time.

The licensing authority sent Ms Rooke-Jenkins two warning letters reminding her of the premises licence conditions following the initial breaches.

But in December last year, police investigating a further assault at the bar were again unable to obtain footage as bar staff were unable to download recordings.

Ms Rooke-Jenkins told the committee that issues with the CCTV system inherited from the pub’s previous licensees, had led to the initial breach and that she had since upgraded the CCTV system.

She said the second incident was a private matter that had taken place outside of open hours and had been misreported to police.

The licensing committee was satisfied that changes had been implemented to avoid further breaches.