THE owner of The Pheasant was forced to shut up shop this week, with the apparent loss of 10 jobs, after licensing chiefs ruled that he had failed to solve long-standing issues with noise and anti-social behaviour at the Haddington pub.

Alan Crawford, who bought the Market Street business in 1977 and put it up for sale earlier this year, was told that he had to cease trading by September 1 by East Lothian Council's licensing board, after members heard that the publican had failed to address problems with loud noise and anti-social behaviour since he last appeared before them in June.

Finlay Mackay, the council's principal environmental health manager, told the board last Thursday: "It has become very clear that there's not been any real improvement in the overall situation." The local authority's noise monitoring team, he explained, had explored the area surrounding The Pheasant 25 times since the June board meeting.

Councillors heard that on four occasions officials discovered "unacceptable" levels of noise from the premises and a further four incidents relating to customers from the pub misbehaving while leaving the premises were also recorded.

Mr Mackay added that the view of the council's noise monitoring team was that, while there were other licensed premises located near to public house, it was The Pheasant and its customers who were a main cause of noisy crowds and anti-social behaviour in that part of town at weekends.

A spokesman for Lothian and Borders Police also informed councillors that members of staff at The Pheasant had called police a dozen times in recent months, asking for help to deal with violent or abusive punters.

"We have been called out to a number of alcohol-related incidents in Market Street when people are leaving the premises, and though the pub can't be directly blamed for this, the staff do have a role to play by serving the customers concerned," he said.

Mr Crawford initially denied at the meeting that there had been disruptive music played at the public house since June.

However, he eventually conceded that he "couldn't disagree" with the information put forward by Mr Mackay and Lothian and Borders Police.

The Pheasant employs two full-time and eight part-time staff.

Councillor David Berry, council leader, said at the meeting: "There seems to be a constant stream of denial here.

"I'm deeply disturbed by the attitude that this licensee seems to be taking with all this.

"We've heard that there has been a number of incidents over the summer; whether it has improved or not it hasn't improved much." And Mr Berry told Mr Crawford: "You are wasting our time here." East Lothian Provost and local ward member Sheena Richardson added: "You're the licensee, you have to be there and if anything happens then it's your licence at risk." Councillors discussed Mr Crawford's licence application for 10 minutes in private before returning to officially refuse him.

Mrs Richardson told Mr Crawford: "We regret that we really feel that we have to refuse this licence." The pub had closed on Monday of this week. The Courier was subsequently unable to contact Mr Crawford for further comment.