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Regulated Entertainment - Government Consultation

The Government, through the Department for Culture, Media & Sport, has now released another consultation which stands to greatly affect the licensed trade and many others - the potential deregulation of nearly all forms of Regulated Entertainment.

Currently, the Licensing Act 2003 requires certain types of entertainment, but not all, to be licensed. In the Foreword to the Consultation, written by John Penrose, Minister for Tourism and Heritage, the laws and regulations surrounding entertainment are described as a “mess” which can impose “a deadweight cost which holds back the work of the voluntary and community sector, and hobbles the big society as well.”

The Minister further states the Consultation is a “golden opportunity to deregulate, reduce bureaucratic burdens, cut costs, give the big society a boost and give free speech a helping hand as well.”

Put fairly simply, the Consultation seeks to remove nearly all the current forms of Regulated Entertainment from the regime created by the Licensing Act 2003 for the vast majority of premises. For once, this will be a most welcome turn of events for the licensed trade and other entertainment operators.

However, the Consultation makes it clear that the following activities will remain licensable:

• Any performance of live music, theatre, dance, recorded music, indoor sport or exhibition of film where the audience is of 5,000 people or more;
• Boxing and wrestling; and
• Any performance of dance that may be classed as sexual entertainment, but is exempt from separate sexual entertainment venue regulations.

Interestingly, although most forms of entertainment will potentially cease be licensed the Consultation proposes that existing conditions on Premises Licences would continue to apply unless the premises decided to apply for a variation to remove or amend them.

Details of the Consultation itself and how to make comments can be found on the DCMS website by following this link http://www.culture.gov.uk/consultations/8408.aspx.  The consultation period expires 3 December 2011 and any comments operators may have will need to be submitted before then.