A BAR in Okehampton will now be open for an extra half an hour on Saturday nights.

Pretoria Vaults, located on North Street, originally submitted a licensing application to West Devon Borough Council to extend their opening hours from 2am until 3am.

West?Devon?Borough Council’s licensing sub-committee considered the amendments which had been made to the application by the applicant in liaison with the police.

These amendments included the hours for licensable activities on Saturday nights to end at 2.30am with closing time of 3am, the removal of the request for two extra hours for non-standard timings and three additional conditions to address the licensing objectives.

The committee decided to grant the application with the incorporation of the three additional conditions requested by the Police because of their potential to reduce public nuisance.

The first condition was that the bar should have a minimum of two door supervisors, who would be retained on duty for 30 minutes after closure of the premises on a Sunday morning to ensure the quiet and orderly dispersal of customers from the premises and its environs.

The second was a written dispersal policy that will be in place and implemented at the premises to move customers from the premises and the immediate vicinity in such a way as to cause minimum disturbance or nuisance to neighbours.

The final condition was that clear and legible notices should be prominently displayed at all exits requesting patrons to respect the need of local residents and businesses and to leave the vicinity as quickly and quietly as possible.

John Perry, who lives and works on North Street, said: ‘We have perviously found blood all over the street where people had been fighting and even found items of clothing in the street that backs on to our house. The behaviour has been despicable.

‘I am not blaming the owners, as I know they do their best to clear the streets when they close, however when the people are not cleared from the street there is often trouble.’

Okehampton Town Councillor, Tony Leech, who spoke on behalf of North Street residents said: ‘The biggest problem is that many local residents have lived in fear for a long time because of the disruption caused by people leaving the premises in the early hours of the morning.

‘We just hope that the conditions that have been put in place will make a real difference. The owners must make sure their customers leave quietly and don’t cause disruption.‘

Stuart McCormack, one of the owners of Pretoria Vaults, said: ‘The Pretoria Vaults has traded until 2am on weekends for the last ten years. The few objections brought to our attention during the recent licence hearing were all from residents that have moved here within the last five years.

‘Prior to this application, a meeting was held with all residents and rather than applying for an extension for both Fridays and Saturdays, we agreed to only apply for Saturday extensions.

‘The Pretoria is not the only commercial property on the street, it’s currently one of seven. The licence extension is needed for the Pretoria’s survival, in a town where yet another public house has recently closed.

‘We hope that our approved extension will allow the much loved late night venue to survive and with the improved end of night stipulations, decrease any after hour noise.’