Glass bottles and glasses to be banned in Plymouth City Centre

GLASS bottles and traditional glasses could be banned from pubs and bars in the city.

It is part of a police move to stamp out trouble in nightspots.

?

In the last year there have been 29 incidents of violence involving glasses or bottles made of traditional material in Plymouth city centre.

That has sparked a crackdown by police on places where there are repeat incidents. Chief Inspector Ian Drummond-Smith said he is keen to encourage licensed premises in Plymouth to switch to plastic or reinforced glass containers which do not create sharp edges when broken.

Those where two or more glassings take place could be forced to ditch glass altogether.

It comes after Chf Insp Drummond-Smith helped roll out a similar scheme in Newquay, credited with helping dramatically reduce the amount of serious violence in the town.

He told The Herald: "In the past year there have been 29 separate glassings in the city centre at 20 different venues.

"As such, I have met with many of the local licensees and we are working together to reduce violence.

"Any premises that experiences more than one incident in a year may well face a ban on glass in their venue.

"There are plenty of alternatives available, including safety glass, plastic or aluminium.

"In accordance with this policy, we have recently commenced legal proceedings against a Plymouth bar in an attempt to ban glass at their premises."

Ch Insp Drummond-Smith said the roll-out in Newquay resulted in an 80 per cent drop in serious violence.

"Plymouth is no worse than other towns and cities across the UK, who all experience this problem with glass attacks," he added.

"The majority of premises are well run and we've been working well with them. They all know that violence is bad for business.

"As far as I'm concerned, one incident is one too many."

Mick McDonnell, chairman of Best Bar None, an umbrella group that represents scores of city pubs and clubs, said traders were largely welcoming the strict new policy.

He said: "A lot of the bigger drinking establishments use toughened glass already, so it's been practiced for a while. To put this in context, there are 260,000 people in the city and there have been 29 glassings in the last year.

"Everyone wants the city to be safer and if there are persistent offenders then they need to toe the line.

"The consensus is that plastic bottles tend to be more expensive than glass, I think that would be the main issue."

But he agreed that punters rarely grumbled at being served a plastic bottle.