Purple Lounge still remains closed

The Newbury town centre pub has not yet reopened after a period where its licence was suspended for one month

THE Purple Lounge in Newbury still remains closed - almost two months after its licence suspension period lapsed.

The Bartholomew Street pub was the subject of a licensing review in March after failing test purchases and serving persons under the age of 18 on two separate occasions in November and January, without asking for photo identification.

At the hearing, Sarah Lefevre, representing the pub owners Punch Taverns, said that Punch Taverns took the failure of test purchases extremely seriously, describing the failure on two separate occasions as “totally unacceptable.”

As a result, she said, action was taken with the existing tenants and the pub had ceased trading the weekend prior to the hearing.

But despite praising Punch Taverns' positive action, councillors still opted to suspend the premises licence for a period of one month and remove the Designated Premises Supervisor from their position.

The one month suspension lapsed almost two months ago, but the pub still remains closed and a spokeswoman for Punch Taverns, Alice Bowden, said this week that the owners' priority was to re-open the pub as soon as possible.

She said: ”We are currently in negotiations with interested operators who we look forward to working in partnership with.”