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Ruling on Fabric licence expected today
By Andy Malt | Published on Tuesday 6 September 2016
The fate of Fabric will be decided today, when Islington Council gets round to holding the licence review that has kept the venue closed for the last month. Optimistically, none of this weekend’s events has yet been cancelled although, speaking to The Guardian yesterday, co-founder Cameron Leslie remained uncertain about the outcome.
“I can’t say I can give you confidence”, he said. “I’m hopeful. But this is a real complex challenge. Look at the picture of London in 2006 then in 2016, and just take that as a snapshot. This is not a thriving industry. If we close I think it would be a rather damning testament to exactly where we are at the moment”.
As previously reported, the London club initially closed as police launched an investigation into two recent drug-related deaths there. Police also requested that Islington Council suspend Fabric’s licence, pending a review, leaving the venue in limbo with fears over the outcome. There has meanwhile been a huge amount of support for the club, with an online petition calling for the venue’s licence to be restored now carrying over 120,000 signatures.
Last week, London mayor Sadiq Khan responded to calls for him to intervene, saying that he was “urging” Fabric, the police and the council to find a resolution that would keep the venue open, but adding that “City Hall does not have the power to intervene in licensing cases like the current situation with Fabric”.
MP for Islington South and Finsbury Emily Thornberry has since lent her support for the venue, saying in a Facebook post: “As the club’s local MP, I have today written to the licensing committee defending Fabric as one of the great cultural institutions in our borough, and expressing my strong view that it must remain open … As a parent, my heart goes out to the family and friends of anyone who has lost loved ones at such a young age, with lives ended before they have even begun. But we must guard against the assumption that dangerous drug use would cease simply if we were to close a nightclub like Fabric”.
Commenting on the club’s existing drug safety procedures, she explained: “For many years now [Fabric] has led the way for other nightclubs in terms of drug prevention measures. Indeed, just seven months ago a judge referred to Fabric as a ‘beacon of best practice’. It has two on-site medics, the highest ratio of security guards to patrons of any nightclub in the UK and a pioneering drug seizure programme, which ensures that every visitor is searched, and any drugs that are found are confiscated and logged”.
“Given this drug seizure programme was apparently developed in conjunction with the police, it is all the more shocking to discover that the logs of these confiscated drugs are now to be used as evidence against Fabric at the licensing committee”, she added.
Further commenting on the police’s part in this story, she said: “I was also extremely concerned to learn that – despite being sent weekly reports by the management of Fabric detailing the times, locations and descriptions of those dealing drugs in the area around the club – even when the police have arrested suspects as a result, prosecutions have been dropped”.
“I appreciate the licensing committee has a very difficult decision to make on Tuesday”, she concluded. “But whilst the question of safety must remain paramount, I sincerely believe that the closure of Fabric cannot be the answer. It may be easy and, in some quarters, it may be popular, but that does not make it right”.
Echoing that sentiment, Night Time Industries Association Chair Alan Miller told The Guardian: “It’s obviously very sad people died, but to isolate it and say it’s down to the responsibility of the nightclub [is wrong]. If you close Fabric, you’ll have to close every nightclub in Britain, because no one has the due diligence, extra staff and safety measures they employ”.
The last review of Fabric’s licence took place last year, again prompted by police complaints about drug-related deaths. This resulted in a successful court appeal by the club, in order to overturn orders from the local council to implement what it saw as unworkable new security measures.
The latest decision on Fabric’s licence is expected later today.
