The report was introduced by Tom Lewis, Team Leader, Licensing who advised the Committee that the report was requesting the setting of a non-standard licence fee of £1,916 for the Tattoo Collective which is a 3 day event due to take place at The Old Truman Brewery on the 17^th-19^th February 2017. The event involves around 150 Tattooists from around the UK providing tattoos to members of the public over the 3 days. A special treatment licence is required for the premises and a one-off licence fee is requested to ensure cost recovery, so that Officers can carry out the relevant checks, inspections and if needed, corrective actions to ensure that the event is safe and the risk associated with blood borne viruses are managed. The event has the same organisers as the London Tattoo Convention which is held each year at Tobacco Dock in Wapping Lane. The venue capacity for the event is 2500 persons at any one time for the 3 days and therefore there is an increased risk of the spread of infection due to the huge volume of visitors undergoing some sort of skin piercing activity.

The Committee raised the following issues: -

·       The fee seemed quite low for such a large event, could the fee not be marginally increased to take into account officer time;

·       Based upon the figures presented in Appendix 1, it works out to be that the officer time would be spent on average about 4 minutes per tattooist, is this enough time to complete inspections and health and safety checks;

·       It doesn’t seem long enough to inspect 150 individual tattooists;

·       What were the costs last year;

·       Are the 150 Tattooists individually checked;

·       Would there be a corporate risk to Tower Hamlets by checking the Tattooists who may or may not be licensed or trained accordingly;

·       What happens if a blood virus is spread, who is liable, Tower Hamlets or the Organisers; and

·       Are the events monitored to gauge the accuracy of the officers time spent on inspections etc. and is the information used for future events.

Tom Lewis informed the Committee that the event is being run by the same organisers who run the London Tattoo Convention each year held at Tobacco Dock and as such there has already been a level of compliance. All the information submitted by the organisers in the “Event Plan” is checked prior to the event including individual Tattooists and whether they are trained and licenced. Spot checks are also completed by officers during the event. If someone contracts a blood borne infection then the organisers of the event are liable as they have a duty of care to the event and its customers. All costs are comparable and have taken into account legislation that only allows for cost recovery. Costs last year cannot be taken into account as it was a different event. He also informed the Committee that the event is monitored including the officers time and this information is then used to influence future events regarding officers’ time.

David Tolley, Head of Environmental Health and Trading Standards informed the Committee that the event will be well managed by the organisers who have previous experience and have a level of compliance including monitoring Tattooists and their needle kits and equipment bins, disposal of blood waste etc. as blood borne infection is a high risk and must be managed properly to avoid any incidents.

The Committee agreed: -

1.     To thank the officers for presenting the report and providing the information; and

2.     That a non-standard application fee for a massage and special treatment licence for the 2017 Tattoo Collective Event be set at £1,916.