Alcohol sales fear prompts Lidl licence hearing

A hearing will decide whether a new supermarket in Wolverhampton will be given an alcohol licence.

Supermarket chain Lidl is opening a new store on the site of the former Gills sausage factory and abattoir in Parkfield Road, Wolverhampton.

An application for a licence to sell alcohol between 07:00 and 23:00 GMT will be decided by the council's licensing committee on 8 January over public health and police concerns.

Public health officials said they wanted to ensure cans of super-strength alcohol were not sold individually and could only be bought in packs of four, given Wolverhampton had one of the highest alcohol-specific mortality rates in the country.

Licensing officers at City of Wolverhampton Council had said Lidl's application contained "insufficient information" to address their concerns.

West Midlands Police and the authority said they were looking to reach an agreement with Lidl over the new licence "to ensure the licensing objectives [were] upheld and [the licence would not] have a negative impact on the wider community."

Mortality and hospital admission rates in the city for alcohol-specific conditions are both significantly above the national average, the council has said.

In 2023, the council said it was reviewing its services after recording the highest rate of alcohol-specific deaths in the country.

Permission was granted for the store and 17 new homes on the site of the former abattoir in October, with approval to demolish the former factory last month.

Lidl said the new store, with a 110-space car park, would create 40 new jobs.

"The development will bring a vacant parcel of brownfield land into active use, remediate the site, provide local job opportunities, affordable housing and bring inward investment to the area," a statement included with Lidl's planning application said.

This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations.

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