A MOVE to stop any future licenced sex establishments setting up in the BCP council area has failed to win approval.

The authority’s licensing committee heard that there had been no complaints about the existing three clubs from the police or public and girls working in them had said they felt safe and secure.

Several councillors argued that the very presence of the licenced sexual entertainment venue made many women feel uncomfortable and their trade was incompatible for an area which sought to promote itself to families.

One woman councillor said she had been the subject of inappropriate remarks when passing one of the clubs in the street.

The comments were made as councillors discussed the new council’s first sex establishment policy. It comes after workshops and consultations held earlier in the year which resulted in some changes to the original wording and conditions.

The final version will need to go to the next council meeting in November for approval.

Cllr Sandra Moore told the meeting in a statement she would like to see no licenced sex entertainment venues in the area because the council needed to protect its image as being family-friendly and protect its residents.

Fellow councillor Lisa Northover also spoke against the clubs and asked the council to consider a zero cap on premises.

She said many girls and women did not feel safe when in the area of any of the establishments and said she had personally experienced sexual harassment from customers leaving an establishment when she was passing by.

She said a women walking with her seven year old daughter had also suffered comments when passing by.

“While women are fearful of passing by these establishments, and they won’t phone the police about them, we are not meeting our obligations under the Equality Act or our public duty to consider the wider impact on women and girls,” she said, arguing that their very presence had an impact on women and girls: “Women and girls have the right to feel safe everywhere,” she told the meeting.

In a statement to the committee Cllr Lisa Lewis said there was a belief that sexual assaults were driven by the sex industry and that the licensing of sex establishments dehumanised women and made them no better than commodities.

Cllr David Brown said although he understood people’s objections the problem for the committee was the lack of evidence. He said that with a lack of police concerns or complaints from the public it would be hard to object to the clubs continuing, although he acknowledged that not all incidents are reported and recorded.

The meeting heard that there had only been one recorded assault involving the clubs – when police were asked to investigate a customer in one of them slapping a performer’s backside.

Cllr Toby Johnson warned that it was too easy to get side-tracked into the wider moral debate but said the committee had only one choice – to make a decision based on the evidence it had before it. He said there was nothing to support a cap on the number of premises, let alone a zero cap.

“There isn’t any evidence here for us to deny any of the venues in our conurbation,” he said.

There has only been one application for a licenced sexual entertainment venue in the area since 2015.

Pic – Cllr Lisa Northover