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Licensed Premises: Kent

Volume 476: debated on Tuesday 3 June 2008

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) how many (a) off licences and (b) other establishments with a licence to sell alcohol in Kent have been prosecuted for selling alcohol to under-age drinkers in each of the last five years; (195148)

(2) how many licensees in Kent have been prosecuted for serving under-age drinkers in each of the last five years.

The number of defendants proceeded against at magistrates courts for selling alcohol to those under 18 years old in Kent police force area from 2003 to 2006 can be viewed in the following table. It is not possible to identify from the data whether these sales were from on or off licensed premises.

The offence of sale of alcohol to a person under 18 can also attract a penalty notice for disorder (PND); there were no PNDs issued for the offence in Kent police force area in 2004, 10 PNDs issued in 2005 and five in 2006.

The number of defendants proceeded against at magistrates courts for certain alcohol related offences in Kent police force area for the years 2003 to 20061,2,3

Proceeded against

Offence description

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

Holder of occasional permission or agent knowingly selling intoxicating liquor to person under 18

3

9

15

14

2

Wholesaler selling intoxicating liquor to a person under 18

0

3

0

0

0

Total

3

12

15

14

2

1 These data are on the principal offence basis.

2 Data include the following offence descriptions and corresponding statutes:

Holder of occasional permission or agent knowingly selling intoxicating liquor to person under 18

Licensing (Occasional Permissions) Act 1983 S.4(l)(a), Licensing Act S.169A & 169B, as added by Licensing (Young Persons) Act 2000 S.I

Wholesaler selling intoxicating liquor to a person under 18

Licensing Act 1964 Sec 181 A(l) as added by Licensing Act 1988 Sec 17.

From these two offences we cannot separately identify on and off premises consumption although both are covered by the statutes.

3 Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that these data have been extracted from large administrative data systems generated by the courts, other agencies, and police forces. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when those data are used.

Source:

Court proceedings data held by RDS— Office for Criminal Justice Reform— Ministry of Justice