Ms Ciara O'Connell:

Much of the anti-social behaviour is due to the fact that people are going out and 2 a.m. is the closing time. They feel they have to cram their night in. We have a lot more power to police ourselves than we are given credit for. Should there be later offerings, people will be able to police themselves and go for the night. With the 2 a.m. finish, people feel that they have to put everything into this certain small space of time. That creates an issue.

The venue I run is complementary to the likes of the Electric Garden and Theatre in Galway. There has to be space for all these venues. I talk a great deal about a scene. We need a scene where our culture and who we are as people can be shown to visitors, be it a small venue like mine or the bigger venues. There is space for everybody to coexist. At the moment the legislation is not allowing that to happen.

Venues like mine are starting to disappear. If we disappear, it will be hard to get us back. Much of what we do in our venue is because I come from a social work background. One of the mentorship programmes we started was connected to electronic music. That is how I met these gentlemen. We brought in young DJs, aged 16 and 17, showed them how to put on a night and aided them in graphic design. A couple of those DJs are now touring all over the world. They came up through my venue, found their way into an artist performance space, and are making a career out of it. We need to provide these spaces for young people so that they can find their feet and cut their teeth in the arts world. This world can be very exclusive and unattainable for certain demographics of young people. If we do not have venues like mine, which are stepping stones into the arts world, it is not going to happen.

My partner will talk about the insurance issue, as he is more au faitwith it.