Pubs and clubs in Aldershot town centre should start paying towards a scheme designed to keep their punters safe, a councillor says.

Labour Cllr Keith Dibble says they should help pay for the new taxi marshals if their presence is making people feel safer and encouraging them to go out in the town on Friday and Saturday nights.

At the moment, Rushmoor Borough Council and Hampshire police pay for the marshals, who are at a taxi rank outside Vox nightclub in Station Road from 10pm to 3am every Friday and Saturday.

At a meeting of the council licensing committee last week, Mr Dibble said: “It’s obviously a very good scheme. Young people that go there are appreciating a safer environment.

However, he said: “If this is a partnership between the council and the police and licensed premises I would ask the question, why is only one part of that partnership funding it?

“If more people are using the town centre because of the marshals, if people are then safer and better behaved, it’s a benefit not just to the local authority and the police.

“If people are going because they feel it’s a safer place to go we should all share the burden.”

The marshals were intro-duced in May this year for a three-month pilot. The pilot was extended for a few weeks but ended, and there were no marshals on September 30 or October 1.

The council earmarked funds to finance them until at least April next year and they returned on Friday October 17.

Two marshals from Reading-based Monarch Security Ltd get people to the queue and direct people to taxis.

Drunk or rowdy people are stopped from getting into taxis, to protect their drivers.

Alan Prosser, manager of Vox, says club and pubs paying towards the scheme is a good idea, but all the night spots whose customers use the taxis should contribute.

He said: “You’ve got to remember that just because it’s outside Vox doesn’t mean it’s only my clientele that use it.

“I won’t have a problem with paying so long as it’s agreed upon by all the pubs whose customers use it.”

He added: “People come down from the Goose or the Queen Vic or any other pub after 11pm and they come down here for a taxi.

Mr Prosser says the scheme has made a big difference on Friday and Saturday nights outside the club.

“It’s made a lot of difference. I don’t see any trouble at all outside when they’re out,” he said. “Sometimes there’s a really long queue and everyone seems well behaved.

“There used to be a sort of unofficial taxi rank outside the club and there was no order.

“You might have been waiting for an hour and someone could have come along and pushed in front and it would have been up to you to back down and say ‘fair enough’ or say something.

“The marshals have taken the confrontation which some-times led to fights out of it . Now you join the queue and everyone gets a taxi, whether you’re a bloke or three girls.”

Speaking at last week’s meeting, David Kingstone, the council’s principal licensing officer, said the scheme aimed to lower the fear of crime.

He said there were concerns people were moving away from Aldershot because of a poor image and he hopes the scheme will help dispel that image. But he added statistics show no “dramatic reduction” in crime in the area since the scheme was introduced.

John McNab, the council’s chief licensing officer, said the council was exploring funding arrangements and had written to pubs and clubs about the possibility of them contributing.