A burger van owner has lost a street-trading licence after bungling council bosses forgot to ask themselves if they were happy to give permission.
South Gloucestershire councillors granted the permit to Karen Sealey for her Cheeks Eats mobile fast-food trailer last April – but it wasn’t until seven months later that the local authority’s property team realised they actually owned the land and decided they hadn’t wanted her to set up stall in the first place.
Licensing sub-committee members revoked her licence for Feynman Way, the road leading to Bristol and Bath Science Park in Emersons Green, at a meeting on Wednesday, March 22. Ms Sealey runs her van a quarter of a mile away in Folly Brook Road under a different, previous consent and wanted to set up a second one next to the busy business park.
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Councillors had approved her application in April 2022 after hearing two people objected on grounds of public nuisance and public safety, while papers to the sub-committee at the time show property services were one of seven South Gloucestershire Council departments contacted during the consultation period but gave no response.
There were no objections from any authorities. Ms Sealey told Wednesday’s hearing that she had not yet used the Feynman Way licence but had intended to in future and had put in a lot of work and expense preparing for it.
But the panel was told that in November the authority’s property investment services manager wrote to the licensing team to say the road had not been adopted and so was not public highway, and that the council as the landowner did not give permission for street trading there.
Council apology
Asked how the “error” was made and why it took so long after the sub-committee approved the application in April for a different department to lodge an objection and seek revocation, licensing officer Keith Jones said: “I don’t know, but as a landowner we have to respect the fact that they don’t wish Cheeks Eats to operate on their land.
“The reason this has taken so long – and I can only apologise to the applicant – is that it was a case of prioritising within the licensing regime, and the fact that this consent had never been used didn’t make it a priority.
“Why property services chose from April up to November to make that decision, I don’t know.
“Perhaps more scrutiny should have taken place within the licensing regime at the time to ensure permission was granted, and that wasn’t done.”
Ms Sealey told the panel that she had done nothing wrong and the fault lay with the council.
“If they had done their investigations correctly at the very start, they’d have realised this was still privately owned council land, I would have been refused at that point and my licence fee would have been refunded,” she said.
“This now really stops me expanding my business.
“I don’t want to give up this patch.
“It’s really close to home, easy for me to get to and I think I would have done really well there.
“This just stops me in my tracks.”
Mr Jones said: “The South Gloucestershire street trading policy states that the consent may be revoked by the council at any time and the council shall not in any circumstances whatsoever be liable to pay any compensation to the holder in respect of revocation.
“This licensing authority accepts that the original application should not have been granted and was incomplete due to the landowner's permission not being granted.
“However, because of this, the licensing sub-committee is invited to revoke the licence with immediate effect.”
The sub-committee agreed and withdrew Ms Sealey’s licence for Feynman Way, although she can continue trading at Folly Brook Road.
Members also requested that the relevant service director be asked to refund her application fee in full despite the policy saying it should not pay that back.
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