LIQUOR CONTROL ACT 1988 - SECT 37

LIQUOR CONTROL ACT 1988 - SECT 37

37 .         Pre-requisites for grants of licences etc.; conditions on licences

        (1A)         In this section —

        public body means —

            (a)         an agency or an organisation as those terms are defined in the Public Sector Management Act 1994 section 3(1); or

            (b)         a body, whether incorporated or not, or the holder of an office, that is established or continued for a public purpose under a written law and that, under the authority of a written law, performs a statutory function on behalf of the State; or

            (c)         a local government, regional local government or regional subsidiary; or

            (d)         any other body, or the holder of an office, post or position, that is prescribed as a public body for the purposes of this definition.

        (1)         An application to the licensing authority for the grant of a licence, for approval to the transfer of a licence, or for a permit to be issued, shall not be granted by the licensing authority unless the licensing authority is satisfied —

            (a)         if the applicant, or one of the applicants, is a natural person — that the applicant is a fit and proper person to be a licensee of the premises to which the application relates; and

            (b)         if the applicant, or one of the applicants, is a body corporate or a public body —

                  (i)         that each person who occupies a position of authority in the body corporate is a fit and proper person to occupy that position in a body corporate that is a licensee of the premises to which the application relates; and

                  (ii)         that the conduct of business at the premises is, or will be, personally supervised and managed in accordance with section 100;

                and

            (c)         if the applicant is an unincorporated body of persons who will not be joint holders of the licence —

                  (i)         that the persons have a common interest of a political, literary, sporting, social or other lawful nature and that the sale of liquor is incidental to, and not the primary purpose of, so associating; and

                  (ii)         that a trustee is, or will be, appointed in accordance with section 35A;

                and

            (d)         that each person directly or indirectly interested in the application or in the business, or the profits or proceeds of the business, to be carried on under the licence or permit is a fit and proper person to be so interested; and

            (e)         in the case of an application for —

                  (i)         an occasional licence; or

                  (ii)         a special facility licence or an extended trading permit where the licensing authority determines that the requirements, or some of the requirements, of paragraph (f) would not be appropriate,

                that the liquor will not be sold or consumed in a place or on premises unsuitable for the purpose; and

            (f)         except where paragraph (e) applies —

                  (i)         that the premises to which the application relates are, or when constructed will be, of a sufficient standard and suitable for the proper conduct of the business to be carried on there; and

                  (ii)         as to the matters referred to in subsection (2); and

                  (iii)         as to the matters referred to in any certificate required to be produced under section 39 or section 40.

        (2A)         Where the licensing authority is to determine whether a person is a fit and proper person to occupy a position of authority in an association incorporated, or taken to be incorporated, under the Associations Incorporation Act 2015 or a public body, the licensing authority may, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, assume that the person is a fit and proper person to occupy that position.

        (2)         On any application the licensing authority may require to be satisfied that any approval, consent or exemption required —

            (a)         under the law relating to planning to permit the use of the premises for the sale of liquor; and

            (b)         under any written law, for the carrying out of building work that is to be carried out before the licence or permit sought takes effect,

                has been obtained.

        (3)         An application shall not be granted where the licensing authority is satisfied that an undue degree of offence, annoyance, disturbance or inconvenience to —

            (a)         persons who reside or work in the vicinity of the place or premises to which the application relates; or

            (b)         persons in, or travelling to or from, an existing or proposed place of public worship, hospital or school,

                would be likely to occur.

        [(4)         deleted]

        (5)         Every licence, other than a club restricted licence or an occasional licence, is subject to the condition that the licensee occupies, and retains a right to occupy, the licensed premises to the exclusion of others, and —

            (a)         an application for the grant or removal of such a licence shall not be granted unless the licensing authority is satisfied that the applicant can, or on the grant of the application will be enabled to, comply with that condition; and

            (b)         if the licensee ceases to occupy the licensed premises, whether or not to the exclusion of others, the interest of the licensee in the licence terminates.

        (6)         The condition referred to in subsection (5) continues to apply to a licence during any period that the operation of the licence is suspended.

        [Section 37 amended: No. 12 of 1998 s. 23; No. 73 of 2006 s. 30; No. 56 of 2010 s. 9 and 39; No. 30 of 2015 s. 222; No. 26 of 2016 s. 66.]