Hartlepool restaurant to reopen just months after closing 'due to costs continually rising'

Earlier this year a new premises licence was submitted by bosses at Spices seeking to allow the Indian eatery to operate at unit 3 in Navigation Point, on Hartlepool Marina.

The restaurant, previously located at 16-18 Navigation Point, said it was closing in January after 22 years “due to costs continually rising of pretty much everything”.

Yet bosses said they were “hoping to relocate and reopen in the near future”.

The application submitted to Hartlepool Borough Council by Nazim Uddin will give the restaurant permission to sell alcohol from noon-11.45pm six days a week and until 11.15pm on Sundays.

Additionally it will allow it to serve food for consumption inside and provide takeaways until midnight each day.

The application went before the council’s licensing sub-committee after an objection was submitted by a Navigation Point resident.

He said he had in the past raised concerns over the volume of music coming from a couple of sites along Hartlepool Marina, including a neighbouring bar owned by Mr Uddin.

However, following deliberations, councillors decided to approve the Spices application in full as they ruled the licence would not have an adverse impact on noise levels.

This was due to it not playing music after 11pm.

Mr Uddin said: “We had to close for certain reasons, so what I’m trying to do now is reopen again in a smaller location, affordable. I don’t know why there should be any objections.”

He added Spices is “very established” in the town and had been based on Hartlepool Marina since 2000.