A MAJOR festival due to take place in North Hampshire has been switched to Gloucestershire after its organisers' bid for a licence was rejected.

Organisers of the One Love Festival planned for Popham Airfield, from September 4-6, had sold tickets and announced its line-up ahead of applying for the premises licence.

As part of the application, the organisers applied for permission to host live and recorded music between 1pm and 2am on the Friday, between 11am and 2am on Saturday and between 11am and 11pm on Sunday and to sell alcohol from 11am to 1.45am on Friday and Saturday and from 11am to 10.30pm on Sunday.

But councillors on Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council’s licensing sub-committee refused the application following concerns over the risk to the public, a single access for all visitors including emergency services and the lack of steps to prevent excessive noise.

The decision follows a meeting where councillors considered representations from a number of parties concerned with the event, including police, council officers and the flying club at the airfield on August 6.

In a report to the committee, PC Claire Wanless, a licensing officer at Basingstoke police station, said the festival has attracted a number of complaints at the locations where it had been held.

She added: “The proposed site for the festival is next to the busy A303. There have previously been deaths of pedestrians on this road – the most recent in May this year, and as such making sure the risks in relation to this road must be addressed. The Chief Officer of Police is not convinced this has been achieved.”

PC Wanless also raised concerns over the event's drugs policy and the lack of consideration for the use of drugs dogs after drugs were found at previous events.

The borough council’s senior licensing officer, Andrew Wake, said he considered it “poor practice” to advertise and sell tickets for an event before obtaining a licence, while Darren Chant, principal environmental health officer, said documents “failed to address” how traffic will be safely managed and how people would be evacuated safely in an emergency.

In the ruling, which was released last Thursday, the sub-committee said that despite efforts to address concerns raised, they felt adequate measures to ensure the public would not come to harm had not been taken.

It added: “The single access is the only route for emergency vehicles. No plan has been drawn up which demonstrates how an emergency vehicle can access the site in the event that the access route is blocked.”

“The event site is immediately adjacent to a live airfield which is expected, subject to the appropriate weather conditions, to be in full operation over the three days of the event. Despite the proposed erection of a barrier, access points and the access road are close to one of the runways.”

A statement from the festival organisers said: “It’s with regret that after building such a great relationship with the Basingstoke and Deane licensing team the site was deemed unworkable for our music festival on mainly evacuation grounds highlighted by the recent local plane crash – we are delighted to have relocated to a venue which doesn’t have such high risks associated with it.”