A South West London chicken shop has won its battle to open late at night despite backlash from worried neighbours plagued by noise in the town centre. Jojo's Peri Peri is now allowed to stay open until 1am after losing a bid to close at 2am in 2021.

Richmond Council's licensing committee was told in August locals are already woken up by noisy revellers in the town and feared disturbance would get worse if the licence was granted. They were worried management might not be able to control customers buying food at night, leaving the shop and being noisy elsewhere.

Peter Willan, from the Richmond Society and Friends of Richmond Green, said residents "suffer today significantly from people [in general] out on that Green, way into the early hours of the morning, on many nights at 3am and so on, waking people up". He raised concerns about antisocial behaviour in the town centre due to the "close proximity of residents, bars, pubs and open spaces" and said locals are "fearful that we are going to get back to a very high hotspot in this area". 

He added: "We really do want successful businesses. But we don't want late hours past midnight… the town is trying to get to sleep then and I think that's where we have a problem here." A letter to the council from Mr Willan says the group isn't saying the problems are caused by the chicken shop but that it "has no control over where customers go and over their behaviour".

But solicitor Matthew Phipps, speaking on behalf of Jojo's Peri Peri, told the committee: "There isn't a scintilla of evidence in a negative form about this operation, its customers, its management or anything in the entire time that it's been trading." He said the application was "much more modest" than the one rejected in May 2021, with no changes to booze sales. He said customers' behaviour isn't a problem at the shop and that conditions addressing all potential concerns had been agreed upon. 

The council's licensing committee found the shop is managed "responsibly" and said there hadn't been any complaints since it opened in mid-2021. A report on the decision said a "substantial proportion" of the shop's sales comes from deliveries anyway.

The report said while "the objectors detailed the risk of harm to the four licensing objectives, there was a lack of detail with regard to this premises, or this locale within the town centre with regard to this that met the threshold". The shop can now stay open from 11am to 1am on Fridays and Saturdays and until 11.45pm from Sundays to Thursdays.