CONDITIONS CONSISTENT WITH OPERATING SCHEDULE
1. The event is being organised by SK Events who have overall lead responsibility for promoting the four licensing objectives specified in the Licensing Act 2003.
2. The event is targeted at the residents of Cockermouth as well as the wider Cumbria region and tourists and food lovers nationwide. The main market for this event will be food and drink lovers and families, including all ages.
3. It is a ticketed event and access to the main site will not be restricted at all to pedestrians but they will have to show their wrist bands in order to gain entrance onto the festival site but will be closed to vehicles.
4. It consists of exhibitors promoting the food and drink on offer throughout Cumbria. There will be both producers and bars and restaurants exhibiting alongside chef cookery demonstrations, activities for children and master classes. The event will include the service and consumption of alcohol on the proposed site (details are given in operating schedule). This will be supported by live music in the folk genre.
5. The Event Areas consists of Main Street and Memorial Gardens in Cockermouth and the festival will run between the hours of 10:30 - 18:00 on Saturday 24th September and 10:30-17:00 Sunday 25th September.
6. The risk assessed stewarding provision is set at 2 Event Managers provided by SK Events (Denise Harris and Anne-Louise Bouffard-Roupe) 1 x site manager 1x Event Controller and Steward Manager (Dean Williamson), 1x Health and Safety Officer, 5X support staff will add additional support with a risk assessed provision of 10 Stewards and 5 SIA licensed officers.
7. Event Control will be located in Victoria Rooms just off Main Street
8. A Steward Control will be located on Main Street
9. The event area has been designed so as to make it so far as is reasonable, accessible to all. All crowd management staff working the event have undergone DDA awareness training. The event organiser is aware of their responsibilities under the DDA legislation and has made provision by having stewards and security on site that are in full radio contact and will contact a member of the event management team where disabled access is needed. We have also installed one disabled toilet on site. A full brief will be given at the beginning of the event to ensure that no problems occur.
10. The Designated Premises Supervisor, Denise Harris, working alongside the event management team will work to ensure that all licensing objectives are met. Within SK Events this relies on a strong management structure with defined roles and responsibilities to ensure good communication between relevant agencies.
11. The event is timed to ensure full access to public transport. The organiser will liaise with local transport providers to ensure they are aware of the likelihood of additional demand and a Park and Ride service will be running both days. We are in the process of organising a temporary taxi rank which all residents and visitors will be made aware of. This is because the normal taxi rank is situated on Main Street and will not be accessible.
12. A road closure letter will be circulated to local businesses and residents to make them aware of the festival and it will be advertised in the local press.
Prevention of Crime and Disorder
13. Prevention of Crime and Disorder is largely reliant upon good communication between relevant public agencies (Cumbria Police, Cumbria Fire and Rescue and Health and Safety Executive) and event sub-contractors including; stewarding and crowd management personnel, security staff.
14. In organizing the event SK Events will address the factors that are likely to lead visitors into crime and removing the opportunities for crime. All marquee structures will be securely fitted and inspected by the Health and Safety officer prior to the festival opening. This will minimise the opportunity for tampering and interference with physical property.
15. Stalls and marquees will be guarded by security staff from Friday evening until Sunday during the time of the breakdown until midnight.
Provision of alcohol
16. The event will be a 30m x 9m ‘beer tent’ in which visitors will be able to purchase a selection of local bitters, lagers and ales. Naturally, alcohol can be a trigger to anti-social behaviour and will be a central factor in the action programme for preventing crime. The Designated Premises Supervisor, Denise Harris, will work with all alcohol vendors to ensure that the strict rules regarding service of alcohol are followed and these rules will be clearly communicated to bars and restaurants both prior to and on the day of the festival.
17. The guidelines strictly adhere to national standards and include:
(a) Display of the Challenge 21 sign in any area where alcohol is available;
(b) No glass is permitted at the festival, meaning that all alcohol must be decanted into plastic cups;
(c) At the first signs of intoxication, customers will be refused service; and
(d) In addition to these measures, SIA registered security staff will actively monitor the beer tent throughout the day and will stay in constant radio communication with event management staff.
Public safety
Traffic Management:
18. The main site of the festival is Main Street. An application for road closure has been submitted and will entail closure of Main Street. Thus Main Street will be pedestrian only between Friday 23rd September 11:00am and Sunday 25th September at midnight.
19. This traffic management plan was put in place with the principal objectives of; ensuring safe pedestrian road use and maintaining visibility for vehicles in the direct vicinity, and preventing traffic build up.
20. Traffic stewards will be present at the start of the diversion in order to monitor the volume of incoming vehicles and advise drivers of the most appropriate route when necessary. Please see the site map for details of the traffic management plan.
This is the plan suggested by the relevant agencies.
Crowd Management:
21. Taste Cumbria will attract food lovers of all ages and Saturday will feature an ‘open-dining event’ which will encourage visitors to move between stalls and restaurants sampling lots of different types of food. It is expected that this will result in fluid crowd movement around Cockermouth, rather than intermittent surges.
22. The nominated Health and Safety officer will monitor crowd tendencies throughout the day. However in the event of a surge in numbers visitors can be easily directed away from the site as it is completely open. Please see site map for the principal points of ingress and egress. .
23. All crowd management personnel will be trained to FSQ Level 2 or equivalent or as necessary in accordance with legislation. The organiser will instruct the stewarding to monitor and report on crowd behaviour and where appropriate take action using SIA staff.
24. The nature of the activity means an identified occupant capacity cannot be enforced by Event Management and their staff.
25. The organiser after consulting the joint agencies should steward the identified points and road closures in order to control ingress/stop ingress to the site or part of it using barriers located at each strategic point
Stewarding Roles
26. A register of all stewards on duty must be kept on site.
27. All steward supervisors MUST be SIA registered to undertake their role as in addition to general stewarding duties they will undertake security roles should it become necessary.
28. General duties of steward
• To provide information to the public as to site layout and facilities;
• To provide information to the public as to the running order/timings of activities;
• To monitor and report on crowd densities;
• To monitor and report on the general welfare of the crowd;
• To assist the Police as directed;
• To control access to restricted areas;
• To assist in extraction of persons experiencing difficulties, especially at a front of house barrier;
• To assist in evacuation should it become necessary to do so;
• To assist the emergency services as directed.
Major Incident Response Procedure
29. Each marquee area will be subject to a small-scale event contingency plan. The decision to implement to the full-scale joint agency contingency plan is that of the Police/Fire/Ambulance depending on the nature of the emergency, and is covered in the assumption of control section.
30. The general responsibilities of Event Management in responding to a major incident may be summarised as follows:
• To alert emergency services;
• To manage the scene until emergency services arrive;
• To provide accurate information to Emergency Services;
• To liaise with the Emergency Services;
• To assist in an emergency evacuation if called to under the direction of the Police;
• To continue to provide stewarding staff after the evacuation under the command of the Police.
31. If the site does reach its occupant capacity, or if public highway levels at which action is necessary (this can be assessed by the methods outlined under the heading Ingress and in Crowd Management section) the Event Organiser after consulting the joint agencies should steward the identified points including road closures in order to support the police in the control of ingress/stop ingress to the site or part of it.
General Public Safety Guidelines
32. This is an outdoor event with surrounding buildings and structures.
• Use of event infrastructure with valid fire safety certificates;
• Co-ordinate approach to planning with emergency services;
• Use of trained security and stewards, advised of location of firefighting equipment;
• Prohibition of the use of petrol generators;
• LPG to be used in accordance with current guidance (See Event safety Guide and Mobile Outdoor Catering Associations.);
• Power supply and distribution to be installed by qualified electrician only;
• All working personnel used on site to be briefed on fire evacuation policy to enable them to take a proactive approach.
The prevention of public nuisance
33. The prevention of public nuisance is an important issue encroaching on multiple areas.
Noise
34. The main street is commercial / retail centred and as such the potential disruption to residents is minimised in terms of proximity to residential and other noise sensitive premises. Hours of operation are between 10:30 and 18:00 and will therefore not cause late night noise.
35. There will be performances of live music by an acoustic folk band (please see the site map for location). These will be kept to low enjoyable background music
36. There will be a producers demonstration kitchen where participants will be those that have a slot to demonstrate their products on stage. Noise will be kept to a minimum and sound will be kept to a minimum and will only be able to be heard within close proximity of the area.
37. The availability of public transport - there is a park and ride in operation during both days, which will be situated at Mitchells Livestock, Lakeland Livestock Centre, Cockermouth, Cumbria CA13 0QQ
Alcohol
38. Our method for controlling alcohol consumption at the festival has been outlined in the prevention of crime and disorder section. However it is important to mention this in relation to public nuisance. We foresee that the likelihood of any violence, disorder or policing problems arising if a licence were granted is not high as a result of alcohol consumption on site. This is in part due to the family and food-focussed nature of the festival which is stressed in the marketing campaign but also because the hours of operation are between 10:30 and 18:00 with trading ceasing at 18:00 sharp on Saturday 24th and 17:00 sharp on Sunday 25th.
External structures
39. There will be no external lighting or flood lights or security lighting on the street since the streetlamp infrastructure is already in place.
Refuse
40. The festival will not put undue pressure on the existing infrastructure to deal with refuse as additional provision will be made to deal with rubbish/litter generated, as outlined below.
• Infrastructure in terms of 8 tonne skips and 50 240ltr wheely bins to be continually emptied throughout the day;
• Collection of litter from around open dining area tables - A team of 20 litter pickers who are paid to specifically keep the site clean at all times.
• The contact ensuring the site is clean at the deconstruction stage will be Denise Harris;
• There is in place; a comprehensive and detailed waste and cleansing programme;
• Noise and waste controls are in place.
Local Awareness and Notification to the local residents
41. An A4 Public Notice will be placed in the surrounding area following submission of this licence application alerting residents and local businesses to the proposed festival in addition to information of the event to be carried by local media as well as a press notice being placed following submission of this licence.
42. Alongside this there is already growing local public awareness of the event which will and continue to grow.
• Leaflets will be used to supplement information for local community;
• Local residents and businesses will be contacted by letter and informed of the arrangements relating to access;
• The event will be managed with the help of stewards and security. Where necessary stewards and security will be used to disperse crowds at the end of the event;
• The event has been scheduled so as to allow access to public transport.
The protection of children from harm
43. Please see attached site map for location of lost child point which will be made clearly visible with prominent signage. The SK Events team and security staff will be briefed by the SK Events event manager, Anne-Louise Bouffard-Roupe, to pay special attention to lost children.
44. To protect children from harm separate facilities specifically for separated minors will be provided and staffed by registered child minders/carers. Records of children reported as separated will be collated to ensure appropriate levels of support are maintained. Where deemed necessary, Social Services will be contacted to provide additional specialist support. The facilities will be located where possible adjacent to secure production area and have free access to the telephone. All working personnel will be advised to the location of the facilities.
45. In respect to any potential physical harm that children might possibly be exposed to, each stall/hut holder is required to provide relevant food hygiene certificates and equipment inspection documentation prior to the event. This is a mandatory stipulation to participation. The design of the hut structure is such that small children are unable to reach any hazardous equipment.