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18 Mar 2009 : Column GC99
Grand Committee
Wednesday 18 March 2009
Arrangement of Business
Announcement
3.45 pm
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Haskel): Before the Minister moves the first order to be considered, I remind noble Lords that, in the case of the two orders, the Motion before the Committee will be that the Committee do consider the orders in question. I should like to make it clear that the Motion to approve the orders will be moved in the Chamber in the usual way.
Legislative Reform (Supervision of Alcohol Sales in Church and Village Halls &c.) Order 2009
Copy of the Order
2nd Report from RRC
Considered in Grand Committee
3.46 pm
Moved by Lord Davies of Oldham
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Legislative Reform (Supervision of Alcohol Sales in Church and Village Halls &c.) Order 2009.
Lord Davies of Oldham: The order amends the Licensing Act 2003 to allow licensing authorities in some circumstances to include an alternative licence condition relating to the supervision of alcohol sales in community premises, including church and village halls.
I pay tribute to the work that members of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee have done in considering the order, which has at its heart a desire to ease the administrative burden on community premises that make such an important contribution to life in our communities, and I know that there is cross-party support; I hope that I am not presuming too much. I also thank organisations such as Action with Communities in Rural England, Community Matters, and the Local Authorities Coordinators of Regulatory Services, which have been working closely with my department and whose input into the development of this order has been extremely valuable.
The proposal aims to remove the legislative burden of Section 19 of the Licensing Act 2003 on village halls and community premises. This section currently provides that where a premises licence authorises the supply of alcohol, the licence must include two mandatory conditions. The first condition is that no supply of alcohol may be made under a premises licence when there is no designated premises supervisor—sometimes
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The order will allow community premises, such as church halls and village halls with properly constituted management committees or management structures, to apply to replace the existing mandatory conditions with a simpler and cheaper arrangement. There will be a fee of £23 for considering applications. The responsibility for alcohol sales will lie with the management committee as the premises licence holder. This is very similar to the existing arrangement for non-profit-making members’ clubs, such as the Royal British Legion or a political club, through which responsibility is collective rather than through a nominated individual.
To ensure that there are sufficient safeguards, the licensing authority will be required to take into account any representations from the police. In addition, should problems occur, the mandatory conditions can always be re-imposed by the licensing authority following a review of the premises licence.
The order has been proposed because surveys indicate that although 90 per cent of village halls have premises licences, the majority of these are limited to the provision of regulated entertainment and do not cover alcohol. That limits the ability of the village hall to host the full range of activities for the community, including fundraising events, local theatre and social functions.
The main reason why many halls have not applied for the full licence relates to the understandable reluctance on the part of volunteers to become a personal licence holder with individual responsibility for authorising the sale of alcohol. That requires paying for a personal licence, a Criminal Records Bureau check, obtaining a necessary qualification and taking time off work for training. Individual volunteers also tend to be anxious about being made the designated premises supervisor, which places a good deal of responsibility on one person’s shoulders.
The total cost of gaining a personal licence is estimated to be approximately £273. We estimate that the overall potential savings under this proposal would be £202,678 per year. It is not a huge sum of money—this is not a hugely significant order, but it removes red tape that will make a difference to volunteers on hard-working village hall committees.
I am delighted that the Delegated Powers Committee recognises the merits of this order and has made no recommendation other than that it should be considered under the affirmative procedure. While we initially recommended that the order follow the negative resolution process, we accept that the number of premises involved and the interest in licensing matters mean that the level of parliamentary scrutiny should be high. I therefore commend the order to the Committee.
Lord Luke: As we heard, the order would give local authorities the option of introducing a different code for community halls so that they do not always have to
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Lord Roberts of Llandudno: I am grateful for the opportunity to talk on this order. The Minister suggested that it was for England, but of course it is for England and Wales—it covers both our countries. Some questions need to be resolved. Is it not better to have a recognised licensee in charge of the sale of alcohol on any premises in the community? I often speak to some of our local licensees in north Wales, who say that the problem is that the supermarkets and so on sell alcohol unregulated, but the pub owner or licensee is able to keep order on his premises. Of course, he stands to be penalised if he fails to do that. We have to look not only at ease, but at making sure that the premises are well regulated by somebody who knows what he or she is doing.
I move on to the managing boards that would take over the responsibility. Having been involved with many managing boards and local hall committees over the years, I know that they change their composition. Sometimes you get an active, responsible committee or board and you would trust them with most forms of activity. But then you have an annual meeting, there might be conflict and the board might change. You might even have conflicts then, because some members might be teetotallers and others might enjoy alcoholic refreshment. That change and instability would not be there if one person were responsible for the licensed hall.
The Minister should think of such things. Especially in the booze culture we face today, they should be seriously considered.
The Lord Bishop of Ripon and Leeds: I welcome this relaxation of the requirement that a designated premises supervisor with a personal licence is needed in every instance where alcohol is supplied in community buildings. I know from personal experience how hard it can be to get someone with a personal licence to provide alcohol, and that this has led to events being cancelled and to community and church halls not being used as effectively as they might be for the benefit of local people. Therefore, I am grateful that the order provides for the management committee to authorise the supply of alcohol in such buildings. I take it that the provisions will ensure that the management committee keeps an eye on what is happening in the building with regard to alcohol, and, indeed, that protests can be made to the police if necessary.
My only concern is that the definition of “management committee” in Article 6(1)(b) is not entirely apt to cover parochial church councils, which are in charge of most of our church halls. I should be grateful for the Minister’s assurance that it covers a PCC as the responsible body in those cases.
Lord Clement-Jones: I thank the Minister for his brief and succinct introduction to this LRO, which constitutes a significant amendment to the Licensing
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It is interesting that the Government have chosen to use this LRRA procedure in this case. Those of us who have campaigned about live music know that that matter would also be a perfectly worthy recipient of the procedure but it has been rather slower in coming forward in that case. However, I recognise that a huge number of premises will be affected by this order, as, indeed, would be by a reform of the de minimis live music provisions. Why was this mechanism adopted? The Government decided after consultation—albeit on rather a small base of consultation—that extending a temporary event notice from 12 to 15 days, or whatever, would not fit the bill and would not be sufficient to meet the requirements. Instead, they decided to amend Section 19 of the Act and add this alternative condition, which you can opt into. I recognise that they consulted widely on the different options available as regards how the alternative condition could be invoked. They have allowed those who run community and village halls to opt into this process where there is a management committee that can hold the licence.
These are long-term licences. My reading is that premises licences last for as long as the building itself. Therefore, in theory, these licences can last for an extremely long time. As my noble friend pointed out, a very big change is involved from individual responsibility—that has considerable consequences for those who hold these licences—to collective responsibility, which is a very different matter.
I recognise the proviso that the licence can be reviewed if there are complaints from the local community in accordance with Sections 51 to 53 of the Act. Can the Minister also confirm that a general review of this LRO is automatically provided for after three years? I believe that that is the case and I would be grateful to him if he could give that assurance. But what is key here is that he should set out the Government’s thinking behind the question about altering Section 19 versus an extension to the TENs regime. What that says is that village and community halls hold so many events that 15 or even 20 occasions are not adequate, so the procedure is not adequate. However, what we are really seeing is the conversion of some village halls into permanent social clubs, which is a significant change. That may well be justified by the consultation and be welcomed by many communities, but it could have a considerable impact on the local environment. I believe that the Government and local communities need to take this step with their eyes open.
The reason we are prepared to give this order a fair wind is not only the review mechanism, but also the clear recognition that this is a deregulatory step, a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Luke. We are as a party committed to deregulation and we welcome it wherever it occurs, particularly for small and local community organisations. However, if deregulation is at the cost of potentially turning some local village halls into social clubs to compete with commercially
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I am sorry to speak at length because I am sure the Minister thought that this would be completely non-contentious, but there are underlying issues. We should be grateful not only to the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee of the House of Lords for pointing out in its report published on 22 January that this should be dealt with under the affirmative procedure, but also to the Regulatory Reform Committee of the other place. That committee did an even more thorough job than our own committee because it looked at the content of the order in greater detail. It made exactly the same point: that this kind of LRO in these circumstances should be dealt with under the affirmative procedure. The Minister should tell us what lessons the Government are drawing from the observations of those two committees. It is all very well for the other place to produce one paragraph saying that the order has been passed by the negative procedure without debate while one of its own committees recommends that it is dealt with under another one, but it is not healthy for the Commons to find itself having to backtrack and have another committee look at it. We need a clear process that reflects the significance of orders being put forward in these circumstances. At the time, the LRRA was welcomed as legislation that would lead to the real possibility of delegation, but that does not mean that we can just do it by sneaking legislative reform orders through the parliamentary process. There has to be a full and proper debate when these matters come up.
Finally, in terms of the impact assessment, I would be interested to hear what the Minister’s latest intelligence is on the number of church and village halls that are likely either now or in the future to take up the new procedure under Section 19. I believe that this is a very significant matter. The consultation was poor in terms of take-up, with a very short second phase. Indeed, if one looks at the sheer number of village and community halls across the country, this could affect thousands of them, and that in turn means that there could be a considerable impact on communities.
Lord Davies of Oldham: I am grateful to noble Lords who have spoken. I reassure the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, that I did not come into this Committee with any presumption that this would be a short debate or that the issue would not be examined carefully. As soon as I saw the composition of the Committee I knew that that would not be the case, and so it has proven.
I also want to disavow the idea that I was trying to restrict the order to England, which the noble Lord, Lord Roberts, suggested. I am not sure that I mentioned England—I am not sure that I could, during a week when it is only Wales that counts with regard to the rugby match on Saturday. He is right; the order applies to England and Wales.
I am grateful for the points that were made. In a moment I will come on to the procedure that I mentioned and which the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, referred
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The noble Lord, Lord Luke, asked me whether the order is intended to reduce burdens and increase flexibility. That is indeed its objective; it will give the community the option to apply to remove restrictions and make it easier for it to obtain a fully flexible licence. That is why, in our consultation, we have had support for this. I hear what the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, says about how we should go about it, but there was a desire that we should have an order that reduced these burdens and red tape. It is modest; we are not talking about huge amounts of money being saved, nor about a great issue in legislative terms. However, it is important to those concerned with organising these events.
I reassure the right reverend Prelate that “management committee”, although I am sorry that it is not spelt out in quite the same terms, is a generic term. It means those who exercise authority and can be held accountable, and of course a parish council is the most reputable body in those terms and meets the bill. The issue is straightforward: we are all aware of the reluctance of individuals to get shouldered with the burden, if anything goes wrong, of taking the heat when in fact there is a broader structure that at the end of the day is responsible because it has identified the individual as being responsible.
It is that broader structure that really holds the power, and it should do. Well, I say it should; the noble Lord, Lord Roberts, said that it should not because members of the structure will disagree among themselves and you will not know where you stand. If that were the case, it would be problematic for the individual anyway if they were exercising that position on behalf of a divided management committee that could not make up its mind whether it wanted the event or not, or on what terms. We already think it is invidious for the individual to carry the load—how much more devastating if they were backed by a management committee that did not really think it was prepared to back them? The scenario that the noble Lord was developing is one where proceeding for a licence would be hazardous if there were that level of dissent. You could have an individual who could presumably, in Napoleonic terms, be the decision-taker, but it would not be a very happy state of affairs if he had taken a decision and the management committee did not back him. There is not really a substantial point there. Any responsible organisation involved in an event that requires this aspect with regard to a licence by definition has to have summoned up the will to reach a proper decision on that and takes responsibility for that decision. If it is so divided that it cannot, it will not get the licence, and that is the end of the matter.
On how we went about it, the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, is right: we could have gone through the temporary events procedure. There are disadvantages to doing that. The temporary events concept is very light-touch indeed. The problem is that we would not get the same flexibility under that structure. Our anxiety would be whether the public are properly protected—which, after all is the basis of the licence concept—if we extend the very light-touch regime for temporary
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The noble Lord is always accurate in his criticism of the Government and asks accurate questions. I think that this is a pretty neat solution. It is certainly one that has commended itself elsewhere. Just for once, I will not be too concerned about that element of criticism. There was a choice, there was a balance, and a balanced decision was taken. I do not have absolute confirmation on the question of the length of the review. Three years was suggested, but I shall have to write to confirm that. I apologise that I cannot give the answer immediately.
On the question of the impact assessment, there are 2,000 community premises without an alcohol licence and 4,000 requiring flexibility, so we are talking about 6,000 premises. That is not epoch-making, but if we can reduce the red tape for 6,000 organisations, we have achieved something worth while.
Is there a danger that the halls become like social clubs because they have licences? The definition of community premises is statutory and in our statutory guidance, so we are covered on that. We can draw a line between community premises and the extension of events to village halls and so on. One safeguard that we have in place is that the licensing authority on application must consider whether the appropriate management committee is in place and the premises must hold community activities. So, first, the premises must shape up as being clearly for the community; and, secondly, returning to the point made earlier, if the licensing authority thinks that there is a wayward management structure and no one knows what on earth is going on, it will not grant a licence. It has responsibility for that.
I mentioned the conditions that we are introducing under the order in my introduction. They can be reintroduced following the review of the licence if there is reason for anxiety or concern; we can re-establish the regime that has obtained until now.
I hope that it will be recognised that this is a well intentioned, benign measure of limited impact that nevertheless will help community events, and I commend it.
Renewables Obligation Order 2009
Copy of the Order
7th Report from JCSI
8th Report from Merits Committee
Considered in Grand Committee
4.15 pm
Moved by Lord Davies of Oldham
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Renewables Obligation Order 2009.
Relevant documents: 7th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, 8th Report from the Merits Committee.
18 Mar 2009 : Column GC106
Lord Davies of Oldham: I beg to move the Renewables Obligation Order 2009, which is part of our attempt to drive further the significant advances we have already made towards delivering our renewables energy targets. Renewable energy is of vital importance to our strategy for tackling the two major challenges we face; that is, combating climate change and ensuring a supply of secure energy for the United Kingdom. That is why the Government support the European Union’s target for 20 per cent of energy to come from renewable sources by 2020. The order under discussion is a significant step forward towards delivering the additional generation necessary to meet our share of that target.
The order has been rightly drawn to the attention of the Committee by the Merits of Statutory Instruments Committee on the grounds that it gives rise to issues of public policy likely to be of interest to the House. I do not need to be convinced of the interest that is always generated by these issues in the House, and certainly not of the interest of Members present on this Committee. During its progress before this House, noble Lords worked with us to ensure that the Energy Act 2008 delivered real benefits for the renewables industry. I am sure it will be appreciated that this order is an extension of that work.
There is of course a great deal more to do, including bringing forward a feed-in tariff for small-scale generation, which was the subject of an important amendment. But we are here to debate the changes we will make to the renewables obligation. We are confident that these changes will drive significant investment in new renewables generation, building on our success to date, and set the stage for the delivery of further new build.
Since its introduction in 2002, the renewables obligation has increased eligible renewable electricity generation from less than 1.8 per cent of total UK supply to 4.9 per cent, almost three times as much, in 2007. The RO was originally designed to be technology-neutral and has been particularly effective at encouraging the cheaper forms of renewables generation, bringing forward large amounts of co-firing, landfill gas and onshore wind.
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