AN illegal boxing match that descended into a mass brawl among the audience has landed the organisers with a bill for more than £7,000.

The Webbington Hotel and Spa, at Loxton, Somerset, staged the charity bouts without the correct licence.

Police were called to the event on Saturday, November 18 last year after it deteriorated into a punch up involving several spectators, with two people taken to hospital for treatment to their injuries.

Subsequent investigations landed Latona Leisure Ltd, which operates the Webbington, in North Somerset Magistrates' Court, where its legal team pleaded guilty on Friday to holding the unlicensed boxing night in a case brought by Sedgemoor District Council.

The company was fined £6,500 for breaching the Licensing Act 2003 and ordered to pay £749 towards the council's costs.

The court heard that Latona's premises licence permits it to sell alcohol and provide live and recorded music and dancing, but does not cover boxing matches.

A council spokesman said: "In addition, a major concern for the council as licensing authority in this case is how little day-to-day knowledge there was of the licensing legislation held by members of the Webbington management team that authorised the event, especially given that they admitted not knowing their licence did not authorise boxing."

Latona Leisure, while admitting the offence, claimed it was not a case of deliberate avoidance but one of omission, for which the company duly apologised.

Around 270 tickets were sold for the evening and the council also noted that drinks were served in glass receptacles rather than plastic ones.

The management team had assumed White Collar Boxing, which ran the event, held a licence for it event but accepted that nobody had checked.

Bosses were also unaware of the location of the premises licence, despite it being a legal requirement for a copy of the licence to be prominently displayed at the premises.

The event was in support of Cancer Research UK, which White Collar Boxing supports.

The council spokesman added: "Latona Leisure fully co-operated with the council during the investigation and fully accepted and admitted their culpability."