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Standing Committee D
Tuesday 8 April 2003
(Afternoon)
[Mr. Roger Gale in the Chair]
Clause 6
Statement of licensing policy
2.30 pm
Mr. Malcolm Moss (North-East Cambridgeshire): I beg to move amendment No. 75, in
clause 6, page 3, line 38, leave out subsection (1).
The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment No. 80, in
clause 6, page 4, line 25, leave out subsection (7).
Amendment No. 135, in
Amendment No. 136, in
Amendment No. 137, in
Amendment No. 138, in
Mr. Moss: Amendments Nos. 75 and 80 are fairly simple and are essentially probing amendments. The Government need to justify why they deem it necessary to prescribe matters in this way, particularly with regard to the duration of the licensing policy. Why must each licensing authority publish a licensing statement every three years, which will follow on from fairly extensive consultations each time? In any event, subsection (3) asks each licensing authority to take into account the views of people in the local area. Subsection (4) provides licensing authorities with the power to revise policy at any time. It is not necessary to prescribe at the outset that a local authority has to go through that hoop every three years.
The Government have required local authorities to carry out reviews of all sorts of things at three-year intervals, so they are bringing this matter into line with what they have already asked authorities to do. If it is not necessary to do it, why make a requirement to do it? If a process is working well, we see no need for a review to be prescribed. If it is not working well, there is provision for reviews to take place as and when the local licensing authority deems it important and necessary to do so.
The Government protest all the time that the Bill is deregulatory, but the clause contains an instruction to
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local authorities that they must set up a completely new licensing policy or review the one that they have got every three years. Unless the Government come up with good reasons, there is no need for that over-prescription.
The Minister for Tourism, Film and Broadcasting (Dr. Kim Howells): We will keep coming back to the fact that the Bill is an attempt to balance the effectiveness of local government licensing authorities, which rightly seek freedom and flexibility, with the interests of the industry which wants a stable and transparent business environment within which to thrive and, above all, the interests of citizens and consumers, who have a right to live and spend their leisure time in a safe and pleasant environment.
As the hon. Member for North-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Moss) told us, amendment No. 75 probes one of the key provisions of the Bill. The clause requires licensing authorities to determine and publish their policy with respect to the exercise of their licensing functions every three years. Before determining their policy or revising it, they must consult local bodies and those with an interest in, and who are affected by, licensing matters. The consultation is with the police, the fire authority, representatives of holders of premises licences, club premises certificates and personal licences, and representatives of local residents and businesses. It is important to keep that policy fully informed as a result of consultation and up to date. I understand that the industry wants as little change and upheaval as possible, but the requirement to determine the policy every three years will balance the industry's need for stability against the flexibility and room for manoeuvre that licensing authorities will require to tackle local issues effectively.
The hon. Gentleman asked why there will be a three-year basis and why, if things are going pretty well, authorities should have to do this at all. The three-year basis reflects the requirement on local authorities to set out their crime prevention strategies every three years under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. It makes good sense to match up and integrate those documents rather than to follow a somewhat vague idea of a licensing policy period or have no regular review of the policy.
Mr. Moss: Does the Minister mean by that that the review of the licensing policy should be coterminous with the review under the 1998 Act, or will there be different three-year periods?
Dr. Howells: No, there may well be different periods, although if a local authority wants to make them coterminous there is no reason why it should not. We have chosen three years because that is a fair length of time and provides a good balance, offering a good sense of continuity. As hon. Members on both sides of the Committee have pointed out in previous sittings, things can change very quickly, especially in city centres. New businesses can arrive and others can close down. Three years is a pretty good balance.
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Mr. Moss: I accept that argument, but as I said in my opening remarks, that is covered by subsection (4), which says:
''During each three year period, a licensing authority must keep its policy under review and make such revisions to it, at such times, as it considers appropriate.''
We have there in the Bill the wherewithal for authorities to react to changes in circumstances, which the Minister mentioned. The question of why we should have a formal three-year assessment is still not answered.
Dr. Howells: In a sense, the hon. Gentleman has made the case. Few changes and little tweaking may be required, but three years is a good period for a local authority to ensure that its licensing policy reflects any changes that may have taken place.
To ensure full consultation and an open and transparent process, the Secretary of State will be able to set, through secondary legislation, a framework of rules to apply to the determination and revision of that policy. Subsection (7), with which amendment No. 80 deals, provides the means through which the Secretary of State may set out such a framework to ensure that there is a level playing field. It is intended that licensing authorities will have considerable latitude within that framework to give them the flexibility to tackle the needs of local individuals and businesses. The regulations could cover, for example, the way in which policies should be drawn up and revised, but they will not dictate the content of the policy.
I hope that, with those reassurances, the hon. Gentleman will see fit to withdraw the amendment.
Mr. Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster): I apologise for being slightly late this afternoon, Mr. Gale.
I shall speak to amendments Nos. 135 to 138, which deal with cumulative effect and saturation. Notwithstanding the words of encouragement from the Minister on the allowance for local authorities to have their own policies in place, there are some grave concerns, particularly in the parts of central London that I represent. I suspect that they are replicated all over the country in stress areas of the large-scale alcohol and entertainment industry.
Interestingly, entertainment saturation is one issue that has failed to be addressed in the draft London plan put forward by the Mayor of London and undergoing extensive consultation, much of which involves a sensible sense of vision—I fear that that will not necessarily be executed under the current incumbent. There is little doubt that deregulation and changing lifestyles have resulted in entertainment venues staying open longer and closing later at night than ever before. The growth in the late-night economy means that more people are out at night and that in turn has led to an over-concentration of entertainment venues in particular areas at the expense of residential and other business users.
Residential users have not gone away. They remain an active part of life in many cities and it is important therefore that fuller emphasis is given to entertainment saturation when setting up a statement of licensing
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policy. As I have said, there is a concern that the proposals in the Bill are overly prescriptive. Inevitably, there will be some opportunity for local authorities to have some say, but the worry is that we are tweaking at the edges rather than fundamentally reviewing the effects of cumulative impact and saturation.
Obviously, the Government have listened and I give the Department some credit for listening. [Hon. Members: ''Hear, hear!''] I hasten to add that ''some'' is the operative word. One does not know for what I was about to give credit—perhaps I should stay silent on that point. That is always best, rather than putting both my feet into it.
The Government have partially reversed their position and accepted that it is necessary for some licensing authorities to be able to deal with the overall problem of saturation. There is still a concern that there may be too great a concentration of licensed premises in particular areas. I appreciate that there is a danger that that may sound like special pleading and I accept that Soho and Covent Garden in my constituency are not typical areas. They are exceptional areas and it would be wrong to couch the whole of the Licensing Bill with Soho and Covent Garden and nothing else at all in mind. However, it would equally be a concern if the Bill ignored the residential interests in our inner cities.
All hon. Members are committed to the rebuilding of our inner cities. Indeed, some cities have already made considerable progress. One needs only to look at the centre of Manchester or Liverpool, which had become extremely derelict by the 1980s. In the past decade, under Governments of both colours, there have been significant improvements in those areas and their vibrancy should not be lessened.
We do not want an overly restrictive licensing regime, but if those areas are to continue to thrive and to have an active residential population, it is important that some balance is reached. There is understandable concern about saturation and the need to give the licensing authority some safeguards so that it can take account of cumulative effect.
The Minister will rightly point out that some of those matters are in the hands of planning authorities. It is perhaps idealistic to assume that planning and licensing will be two entirely discrete areas. I very much agreed when the Minister said this morning that the last thing that business or, for that matter, anyone else wanted was an uncertainty of regime, in which the authority gets a second bite of the cherry and can say, ''We lost as far as planning is concerned, but we will now throw the licensing book at you.'' That would be wrong, but one must accept that planning and licensing matters will not be entirely divorced from one another, particularly when it comes to aspects such as the saturation that affects many of our larger cities.
I hope that the Minister will give considerable thought to the representations that he will continue to receive on the matter and that there will be no question that local authorities, particularly in the middle of our bigger cities, will be able to consider cumulative effect and saturation in drawing up their policy; in other
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words, that they will be given an opportunity to devise a statement of licensing policy under clause 6 that will take account of local factors that may not necessarily be widely seen throughout the rest of the country. Without that safeguard there is an understandably real fear that some of the good intentions underlying the Bill will come to naught.
2.45 pm
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