A CRUCIAL meeting over the future of one of York’s biggest nightclubs has been put on hold.

City of York Council was due on Monday to consider calls by North Yorkshire Police for changes to the licence at The Gallery, after cheap drinks promotions earlier this year led to crime incidents soaring by 1,050 per cent.

But the licensing review has been postponed to allow the club’s new owners, Ranimul 2 Limited, to go through details of incidents collated by police and the council, and to take action over concerns raised about the venue. A new date has been pencilled in for April if the meeting is still deemed necessary then.

North Yorkshire Police officers had claimed The Gallery’s previous management had been putting their commercial interests above their licensing responsibilities.

The Press revealed in November how the force wanted new conditions placed on the club’s licence. These included an earlier closure time and the maximum number of customers being lowered from its current level of 775 to 500.

Police recorded 192 incidents connected to the club between January and October last year, including almost 50 thefts as well as assaults on officers, door staff and customers, glassings, drinks being spiked and arrests for drunk and disorderly behaviour. A report by the Safer York Partnership said that in the 52 days after the club launched a cut-price drinks offer last May, crime spiralled by 1,050 per cent compared to the previous 52 days.

A report which had been due to go before Monday’s meeting also claimed clubbers using The Gallery’s smoking terrace regularly threw bottles into a neighbouring taxi firm’s car park.

Two warning letters were also sent to the venue’s management by Nigel Woodhead, the council’s licence enforcement officer, last summer, in which he said Streamline Taxis had complained about the bottle-throwing.

York Police’s licensing officer PC Mick Wilkinson said: “The postponement is to allow disclosure of incidents concerning The Gallery to its new operators, and we also feel it is appropriate to give them an opportunity to show how they operate and that they can meet the requirements of the licence.”

The Gallery’s previous owners, Luminar Leisure, went into administration in October with debts of £140 million, but the firm was later bought by leisure industry specialists Peter Marks, Alex Geffert and Joe Heanen, under the company name Ranimul 2.

Nobody from The Gallery was available for comment.