A judge in Sheffield has rejected an appeal by the operator of The Leadmill against Sheffield City Council’s decision to grant his landlord, The Electric Group, a shadow premises licence for the venue. Allegations of mismanagement and bad conduct made against other venues run by The Electric Group were mere “hearsay”, district judge Tim Spruce concluded.
“The Electric Group continues to operate despite the suggestion that those premises are a den of iniquity for rape, sexual assault, violence and the proliferation of drugs and anti-social behaviour”, Spruce stated, adding that, therefore, “I am being asked to conclude that the licensing authorities of Lambeth, Bristol and Newcastle turn a blind eye to a blatant undermining of the respective licensing objectives of those cities”.
Long-time Leadmill operator Phil Mills has been fighting efforts by The Electric Group, which has owned the Leadmill building since 2016, to take direct control of the venue. The landlord gave Mills twelve months notice to vacate the premises in March 2022. When Mills refused to do so, Electric Group boss Dominic Madden began eviction proceedings. An initial court hearing on that matter in May was adjourned, with the case now due to return to the Leeds Business And Property Court on 16 Dec.
Concurrent to all that was The Electric Group’s efforts to get a shadow premises licence for The Leadmill. If it held such a licence, it would be able to legally operate the venue as soon as Mills and his team departed, rather than having to go through the licensing application process at that point. For a time, the application for a shadow premises licence by The Electric Group became a key focus of the Save The Leadmill campaign run by Mills.
However, it always seemed unlikely that the council would reject The Electric Group’s application, even in the face of high profile opposition from The Leadmill’s supporters in the Sheffield music community, because the licence could only be refused if doing so would result in “the prevention of crime and disorder; public safety; the prevention of public nuisance; or the protection of children from harm”.
To that end, Mills presented hundreds of pages of negative reviews of venues run by The Electric Group in London, Bristol and Newcastle, as well as allegations of criminal behaviour linked to those venues. At a licensing hearing, a legal rep for Mills claimed The Electric Group “has a fundamental disregard for safety”, but Madden insisted “we have an outstanding track record of compliance”.
The council’s licensing committee granted the licence, which led to Mills filing an appeal and re-presenting his arguments against his landlord in Sheffield Magistrates’ Court last week. But, according to the Sheffield Star, Judge Spruce said the allegations against The Electric Group and its other venues were unsubstantiated and unsupported by first hand accounts.
“It does not mean that those incidents did not happen”, he added, “but the inability to challenge the probity of what is reported means that a tribunal logically must ascribe less weight to that evidence”.
Despite rejecting the appeal, the judge said he has real sympathy for Mills, who “has been at the forefront of events which have contributed enormously to the lives and enjoyment of the citizens of Sheffield and probably well beyond this city”. He added that Mills’ “passionate resistance” to the shadow licence application was probably “driven by his fear of losing the ability to continue that work”.
Whether or not Mills will be able to carry on that work at The Leadmill into 2025 will now be decided at the court hearing on the eviction proceedings in December.