Thirsty Camel Loses Licence After Police Raise Concerns
Battersea corner shop accused of selling laughing gas canisters
Thirsty Camel, 246 Lavender Hill. Picture: Google Streetview
July 4, 2023
A Battersea corner shop has lost its licence following allegations it previously sold nitrous oxide, also known as laughing gas, to customers. Nitrous oxide canisters were found by police officers in August last year at Thirsty Camel, in Battersea, along with a knife under the counter and snap bags.
The Metropolitan Police ordered a review into the shop, on Lavender Hill, and also raised concerns about CCTV, staffing and recording incidents.
Wandsworth Council’s licensing committee decided to strip the licence held by the venue after a hearing on June 21. The committee ruled “there was no appropriate alternative”.
A witness statement from PC Natali Lelas, revealed in council documents, said officers found “zipper bags, which are normally used to package drugs, i.e cannabis, these are normally called snap bags” behind the counter during a visit on August 2, 2022.
Officers “found a knife under the counter on the top shelf”, according to the statement, which was removed.
PC Lelas, who requested the review on behalf of the Met Police, told the hearing on June 21 officers also found “many bags of balloons” during the visit on August 2.
The officer added, “We found further large NOS canisters that come in a pack of six, five or six. With regards to this, vehicles have been seen by police officers, who are on the Safer Neighbourhoods Team, vehicles attending and providing the premises with these boxes of NOS.” She explained the police seized the items.
Nitrous oxide, also known as NOS or laughing gas, is often used as a recreational drug and sold in metal canisters.
PC Lelas said the shop had also continually breached conditions on its premises licence concerning CCTV, staffing and recording incidents.
She said officers had found CCTV at the shop not working properly or recording for long enough “on more than one occasion” – most recently, during another follow-up visit on April 5.
She said, “We’ve had further breaches where there needs to be three members of staff on duty past midnight, there’s only ever two.”
She added, “They have no records of security incidents, no refusal records or anything like that that they can provide to us.” She asked for the licence to be revoked.
Licence holder Manish Kanal said the knife was “already there” in the shop when he took over from the previous owners. He said it was only occasionally used to cut food, not as a weapon, and was there alongside stationery.
He said snap bags can be used in different ways, including to store spices, and he did not ask customers what they were going to use them for as that would be rude. Snap bags are not illegal to sell, he added, but the shop has not sold them since the police intervention.
Licensing consultant Surendra Panchal, representing Mr Kanal, also said the shop’s CCTV had been fixed and it is now “recording to 31 days”. He said the shop has not sold nitrous oxide since 2022 after being made aware it was illegal to sell.
The consultant said Mr Kanal’s father had been working at the shop but fell ill, meaning “there was no staff available at that very instance and that is one of the reasons they had only two staff working at the premises”. He said the shop was advertising for another member of staff, and that it has a refusals book, incident book and training manual which are used regularly.
Mr Panchal said he had advised the shop to change its designated premises supervisor, a position currently held by Mr Kanal. He said the new supervisor would be trained at a higher level, and asked for the committee to suspend the shop’s licence for a month to make sure everything is in place instead of stripping the licence as “the family depends on the shop”.
Mr Panchal later said the shop wants to work with the authorities, adding, “We understand the times we are going through at the moment and it would be a disaster for the family to go down if the licence was revoked.”
The report on the committee’s decision said members “expressed sympathy with Mr Kanal who was managing a small family business” but raised concerns about “the persistent nature of breaches of conditions”.
The report said the committee “was sympathetic to the reasons behind operating with only two staff after midnight” but “Mr Kanal’s willingness to again breach the conditions of the licence added to concerns that this behaviour was unlikely to change”.
It added members “were particularly concerned about the sale of NOS which was linked to anti-social behaviour in the area, the sale of snap bags which were linked to criminality and drug use, and the knife which had been found behind the counter”. They decided to revoke the premises licence.
Charlotte Lillywhite - Local Democracy Reporter