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Friday, April 4, 2014

Rob Ford’s alleged after-hours drinking prompts citations for B.C. pub


Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was captured in several tweets, Instagram posts, and videos by Lower Mainland locals at The Foggy Dew pub in Coquitlam Friday night. The mayor also received a ticket from police that night, for jaywalking across North Road. Catriona Korucu/Instagram



Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was captured in several tweets, Instagram posts, and videos by Lower Mainland locals at The Foggy Dew pub in Coquitlam Friday night. The mayor also received a ticket from police that night, for jaywalking across North Road. Catriona Korucu/Instagram
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was captured in several tweets, Instagram posts, and videos by Lower Mainland locals at The Foggy Dew pub in Coquitlam Friday night. The mayor also received a ticket from police that night, for jaywalking across North Road. Catriona Korucu/Instagram
British Columbia's liquor regulator says a Vancouver-area pub that was apparently visited by Rob Ford during the Toronto Mayor's brief trip to the West Coast was cited for serving patrons after hours over the incident, but it won't face fines or suspensions.
The Toronto Star published a story in February that alleged the Foggy Dew pub in Coquitlam, east of Vancouver, served Ford drinks after the bar's last-call time of 2 a.m.
Ford, who was in the region for a funeral, generated headlines during his first night in town after he was ticketed for jaywalking by the RCMP in Coquitlam. Predictably, his night out was documented in photos posted to social media.
The Toronto Star report quoted an anonymous source who claimed Ford visited the Foggy Dew several hours after his jaywalking ticket.
The anonymous source said Ford entered a staff washroom at the pub in the early hours of Feb. 1 and emerged an hour later "talking gibberish." The source alleged Ford later ordered a round of beers, high balls and shots after the bar was closed.
2 citations
B.C.'s liquor regulator looked into the allegations and on Friday confirmed the pub was handed two citations.
"In this case, based on that review, the inspector issued two contravention notices to the licensee — one for failing to clear the establishment within half an hour of the end of liquor service and one for allowing patrons to consume liquor beyond the time permitted by the terms of its licence," the branch's general manager, Douglas Scott, said in a written statement.
Earlier, the branch issued a brief statement that simply said there was insufficient evidence to support fines or suspensions, but did not mention the contravention notices.
Scott's statement said contravention notices are "notices of alleged non-compliance and are intended to give the licensee a heads up that there are specific concerns that will need to be discussed further."
In the end, an inspector did not recommend any further enforcement action, though the notices will remain on the pub's file.
Ford not mentioned
Scott's statement, which doesn't mention Ford, said the branch doesn't comment on specific patrons.
A spokesman for the pub's parent company, Gibson Hospitality Inc., could not be reached. A supervisor who answered the phone at the bar declined to comment.
In February, John Teti of Gibson Hospitality refused to answer questions about what happened at the Foggy Dew or even confirm whether Ford was there. Teti said he couldn't comment because of a possible investigation.
Ford's chief of staff did not immediately return an email Friday requesting comment.
Ford vowed last year that he had given up alcohol — part of a campaign to rehabilitate his image after admitting to having tried crack cocaine while mayor.
In the months since, he has been repeatedly forced to square that pledge with his own behaviour. For example, less than two weeks before his trip to Vancouver, Ford admitted he had been drinking during an incident in which he was filmed using Jamaican swear words and other profanities at a Toronto restaurant called Steak Queen.
Ford is currently running for re-election in Toronto, where voters will cast ballots in October.

Lena Dunham on Girls sex scenes: You have to know each person’s limits

Girls star Lena: I am careful with sex scenes
Lena Dunham has discussed sex, Posh Spice and fan reviews of Girls (Picture: Anthony Harvey/Getty Images)
Exclusive: Lena Dunham says there is a fine line when filming sex scenes between being ‘comfortable’ and feeling ‘violated’.
The multi-talented 27-year-old writer, director and star of TV’s Girls has been near-universally praised for her boldly honest approach to sex scenes in the show but says she is always considerate of her male co-stars whenever they strip off for an intimate moment.
‘It’s really important in a sex scene to know each person’s limits, if they’re going to be comfortable if you improvise slapping their ass, or if it’s going to make them feel really weird and violated,’ she told a packed London audience as the show made its third season UK premiere on Wednesday.
While the show has won fans around the world for showing the struggles of four twenty-something women living and working in modern day New York, it seems some have found issue with Dunham’s approach to showing realistic sex scenes – and with her herself.
‘A lot of people like to tell me they hated the show, and me, when they first saw the show,’ she said.
The cast of Girls were in London on Wednesday (Picture: Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)
The cast of Girls were in London on Wednesday (Picture: Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)
She also expressed her slightly masochistic approach to keeping up with the response from viewers, explaining: ‘I read all the tweets and I don’t know if it’s a good idea, but I can’t stop the joy and the pain.’
Dunham also took the opportunity to play down recent reports that Victoria Beckham is being lined up to guest star on the show.
‘We would be very excited to welcome Victoria Beckham on to our set, but this is an arranged marriage made by the Daily Mail,’ she said, adding she thought 39-year-old Posh would be too ‘chic’ to appear on the show.
This week the New York born star made her debut on the cover of American Vogue where she again addressed her bold approach to sex scenes in her show.
‘Seeing somebody who looks like you having sex on television is a less comfortable experience than seeing somebody who looks like nobody you’ve ever met,’ she told the magazine, emphasising the fact that she has become something of a figure-head for ‘real sized’ women in today’s celebrity obsessed culture.
However her appearance on the magazine cover has sparked controversy with many criticising the use of airbrushing on the star and observing the decision to provide a close up of Dunham’s face as the cover shot as opposed to her full body.
Girls series three begins airing in the UK on Sky Atlantic on Monday 20 January 2014 at 10PM.
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