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Lord McCluskey: I am sure that the language of my amendment could be improved upon and, had we but time, I would do it. Under the Bill, a sentence of life imprisonment does not mean life imprisonment. That is a serious point. Therefore, I am attracted by the proposition advanced by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, that one could have a kind of protection of the public order. Accordingly, the judge would say to a defendant, "You will spend the next 10 years in prison and, at the end of that time, an order will apply to you under which you will not be released until the Parole Board decides that it is safe for you to be released". That would make perfectly good sense.
Of course, that would have echoes of the sentence which I believe was abolished in 1949; namely, a sentence of preventive detention. That is really what the Government are talking about. For example, you take a person who has proved himself, by consistent recidivism in a particularly nasty way, to be unfit to be out. You preventively detain him and then you give the Parole Board the power to release him. It seems to me that that would be an appropriate kind of name to use. No doubt the Government, in pursuing the notion of honesty in sentencing, will think again about the words. In the hope that they do so, I do not propose to press the amendment. In the circumstances, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
The Earl of Courtown: I beg to move that the House do now resume. In moving the Motion, perhaps I may suggest that the Committee stage begin again not before 8.35 p.m.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
Public Entertainments Licences (Drug Misuse) Bill
7.33 p.m.
Baroness Anelay of St. Johns: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.--(Baroness Anelay of St. Johns.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (Baroness Nicol) in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [Licensing outside Greater London]:
Lord Meston moved Amendment No. 1.
The noble Lord said: In moving the amendment, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 5, 12, 16 and 22. I promise that this group of amendments is the only group to which I shall speak at any length. On Second Reading there was, quite properly, support from all sides of the Chamber for the principle of the Bill. However, concern was also expressed about how it might work in practice. In particular, there was concern about the fairness and the consistency of the procedures which might operate and there was also concern about the looseness of some of the wording. Some reassurances were given by the Government on Second Reading, but I have to say that they were not very convincing.
The first reassurance was that the powers to be given by the Bill would normally be used only as a last resort. The difficulty about that proposition is that there is no indication of it on the face of the Bill. It provides no preliminary procedures or safeguards for fairness. It is meant to be a tough Bill and I repeat that we support its principle. But its very toughness reinforces the need for some more apparent fairness.
The second reassurance given was that most local authorities already hold hearings before deciding to revoke a licence. The difficulty about that is the fact that the holding of a hearing is not universal and the procedures are not uniform; for example, there are no underlying rules setting out even minimum standard requirements for such hearings. The third reassurance given was that Home Office guidance would be issued to accompany the Bill when it became law. However, the guidance was not even in draft form on Second Reading, let alone being the subject of consultation with the various interested bodies. Since that time, the noble Earl has been good enough to send us a preliminary draft of the guidance, but the difficulties remain. It will only be guidance and will not be binding. I understand that in other areas of licensing law, even where there is some form of guidance, it is not necessarily adhered to. There remain variations of practice and of procedure, inconsistencies and anomalies, all of which tend to encourage appeals.
The first group of amendments relates to Clause 1 which governs licensing outside Greater London. In fact, they could all be applied to Clause 2 but I have not further burdened the Marshalled List. They seek to improve the Bill in a number of ways. First, they would require there to be substantial evidence of the serious
Thirdly, the amendments would require the police, as a first step, to serve a written caution on the licence holder setting out the problem perceived by them and seeking details from the licence holder of what he has done, or what he will do, about it. In that respect, I suggest that paragraph 9 of the draft guidance is remarkably limp. Finally, the amendments would require a licensing authority to be satisfied that not renewing the licence or revoking it will substantially reduce the problem.
As regards that last part of the amendments, I should say that I recognise that the amendments of the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, would insert the word "significantly". I certainly do not want to argue about adverbs. Nevertheless, I would suggest that the phrase within the amendment which states that the licensing authority must be satisfied that revoking or not renewing the licence will substantially reduce the problem is preferable to the phraseology which would be within the Bill if amended as the noble Baroness proposes: namely, that not renewing or revoking the licence,
The Deputy Chairman of Committees: If this amendment is agreed to, I cannot call Amendments Nos. 2 and 3.
Viscount Ullswater: The noble Lord, Lord Meston, has outlined the reason why he has introduced this amendment; namely, the need for a written caution. Most of those who spoke at Second Reading introduced the concept of the requirement for this written caution. This amendment proposes that a written caution should be introduced and gives the licence holder 14 days to supply the chief officer of police with details of all the steps to be taken as regards the serious drugs problem that has been identified by the police. This matter was dealt with at Second Reading and has been ably introduced tonight by the noble Lord, Lord Meston. I believe that this gets to the heart of the matter and would overcome the difficulty of a club being ambushed by the police--this has been mentioned to me--often when that club considered it had a satisfactory relationship with the local force.
I know there is a problem as regards promoters who use premises and who might not be so careful as regards supervision or doormen. There is also the rather nasty difficulty of the operators of one club trying to disrupt the trade of a rival by unscrupulous means. The amendment would give the licence holder 14 days' grace before the local authority is informed. That is a matter of his putting his house in order or getting his house in order if this serious problem has been
Mention has already been made of the guidance notes. I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Courtown for circulating them. I understand that they are in draft, but it is interesting to see the sort of outline that these guidance notes will take. The guidance notes are particularly weak as regards the reference to "near". Although they explain that the Bill does not elaborate the meaning of "near", the guidance notes also proceed to duck the issue.
The worry of the industry is that local authority licensing committees act in an inconsistent way across the country at present. I refer to children's certificates. The committees will continue to act in an inconsistent way. I believe that the guidance notes should be much more prescriptive than they are at present. However, they are not all bad, and I welcome them. The guidance notes indicate at paragraph 13 that there is now an important requirement to be fulfilled in that revoking a licence would have to be of assistance in dealing with the problem. My noble friend Lady Anelay wishes to insert the word "significantly" into that requirement. Paragraph 13 further states:
That is helpful. However, it makes the need for reasons, which we shall discuss in the next group of amendments, even more important. I shall have a little to say about that when we reach it.
As I indicated on Second Reading, the guidance notes do not help at all as regards the definition of a serious drugs problem or the definition of "near" the premises. We have requested those definitions. I hope that the guidance notes will be made more helpful in that regard, otherwise the courts will have to decide the matter, and that is a slow and expensive process. I doubt that my noble friend Lady Anelay or the Government will accept this amendment. I regret that, but realistically I accept that that will be the case. Therefore we have to rely on the guidance notes which suggest that,
That is helpful. The guidance notes continue,
That is helpful, but I believe it places far too much faith in the local authority and its officials. There must be a clear duty placed on the local authority to consult with all relevant parties before acting. I believe this group of amendments achieves that objective. I commend them to the Committee. At Second Reading I indicated that I had an interest to declare; namely, I am a director of Rank Leisure Limited which operates clubs which have a public entertainments licence.
Lord Monson: Not long after they were published I added my name to all the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Meston, because it was immediately evident that they admirably resolve all the fears and reservations that were expressed in various quarters of the Chamber at Second Reading about the possible injustices that might result from this Bill as originally published. As regards this group of amendments, any problem must be serious, any evidence must be substantial, any caution must be in writing, and any drastic action provided for by the Bill can take place only if it will substantially reduce the problem. Above all, where drug offences are committed nearby rather than at the premises in question, the nearby location in question must be,
if a closure is to be contemplated; in other words, if the licence is to be withdrawn.
I would never claim for a moment that all club proprietors are as pure as the driven snow. However, I guess that most of them would not condone or facilitate drug taking. It would be quite wrong if innocent people were to lose their livelihoods merely because their clubs happened to be situated near an unfenced public park open 24 hours a day, or near an area such as Epping Forest where drugs can easily change hands with little fear of detection.
Page 1, line 12, leave out from ("where") to end of line 16 and insert ("there is substantial evidence of a serious problem relating to the supply or use of controlled drugs at a place in respect of
which has been granted an entertainments licence under paragraph 1 above or at premises near such place which are under the control of the holder of the licence, and--
(a) the chief officer of police has served a written caution on the holder of the licence setting out the nature of the serious problem relating to the supply or use of controlled drugs at the place or nearby premises and requesting the licence holder to supply to the chief officer of police within 14 days from the date of service of the caution details of all steps which the licence holder has taken or proposes to take to deal with the problem; and
(b) not less than 14 days from the date of service of the caution the authority by whom the entertainments licence was granted have received a report from the chief officer of police that the police have substantial evidence that there is a serious problem relating to the supply or use of controlled drugs at the place or at premises near such place which are under the control of the holder of the licence.").
"will assist in significantly dealing with the problem".
"under the control of the holder of the licence".
"If a local authority considers that the problem would continue unabated even if the premises were shut, then the test will not be met".
"it would be unusual for a licence holder not to be aware of police concerns before a chief officer reports to the local authority. It is expected that the report itself will refer to previous exchanges with the owners or managers of the premises".
"It would be good practice in other than emergency cases for the local authority before reaching their decision to inquire into the extent to which the owners or managers have been made aware of the drugs problem".
7.45 p.m.
"under the control of the holder of the licence"
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