Cambridge City Council have rejected Tesco’s bid to sell alcohol at its East Road store. The decision was taken on Monday, following objections from the City’s police force. The store, which is not yet open, had hoped to be able to sell alcohol from 10am to 10pm

The East Road Tesco, which lies close to Anglia Ruskin University, was hopeful that its bid would be accepted, promising that all of its employees would be trained to sell alcohol responsibly, as well as proposing not to stock lager or beer with more than a 5.5% alcohol content.

However, as Christine Allison, a member of the City Council’s Licensing Sub-Committee, explained, the new store is to be situated in a “cumulative impact area” which means that “there’s a saturation of licensing premises already”. Concerned from police reports about anti-social behaviour in the area, the Licensing Sub-Committee decided that accepting Tesco’s bid would risk causing more trouble.

Several residents and other local businesses had objected to the proposals to sell alcohol, given the area’s notoriety for violent crime.

The new Tesco’s store will be situated in Petersfield Ward, which was recently cited as having the highest crime rate of all the Wards in the East Neighbourhood. Accordingly, the police have specifically targeted this area for improvement, and since January 2008 incidents of violence and crime have decreased.

In addition, the Licensing Sub-Committee feared that the increased availability of alcohol might put excessive pressure on local community services such as Jimmy’s Night Shelter, providing security for the homeless, and Drinksense, an Alcohol Advisory Service, both of which lie on East Road.

Tesco’s have argued that permitting their store to sell alcohol would not have adversely affected behaviour in the area as an off-licence in a nearby Marks and Spencer had only recently been closed.

Despite the refusal of their alcohol licence bid, Tesco’s still plan to open their express store, although a date of opening has not yet been confirmed.