At the Licensing and Gambling Acts Committee on Monday, 22 September 2025, the Committee agreed to not adopt the proposed Special Saturation Policy 2025-2028 as, based on the cumulative impact assessment before them, the Committee were not of the opinion that the number of licensed premises within the City Centre and East Oxford areas is such that it is likely that granting further licences (or variation to licences) would be inconsistent with the licencing authorities duty to promote the licencing objectives.

Council is recommended to:

1.    Agree to not adopt the Cumulative Impact Assessment for 2025-2028 and the continued Special Saturation Policy covering City Centre and East Oxford areas

The report will be published within a supplement ahead of the meeting.

This report was deferred to a later meeting. The Monitoring Officer clarified that members would not be able to ask questions or discuss the report at this stage, but that the report would return to members for consideration later and that a full briefing would be provided to all members in due course.