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EMROs and the Late Night Levy - Update

The Home Office has today published its final policy decisions and its response to the recent consultation on the implementation of Early Morning Restriction Orders (EMROs) and the Late Night Levy (LNL).

The conclusion to the ‘Response to the Consultation' document (which document can be found HERE) and the supporting fact sheets suggests that it remains the intention to bring EMROs and the LNL into force in October 2012, which may still prove to be ambitious given the requirement for secondary legislation, but we have seen the Home Office working to a tight deadline before!

The supporting factsheets also suggest that the Home Office estimates the earliest date a Licensing Authority could introduce a levy would be April 2013. For EMROs the anticipation of the earliest date for one to be actually introduced is March 2013.

In summary, their final policy determinations include the following intentions:

Early Morning Restriction Orders (EMRO)

• Persons that may be affected by an EMRO will have 42 days (increased from a proposed 28 days) to make relevant representations for, or against, a proposed EMRO.
• Licensing Authorities will be required to notify only licensed premises that would be included in the scope of a proposed EMRO, rather than all licensed premises in their licensing authority area.
• A proposal to introduce an EMRO should be publicised on the Licensing Authority's website and in their local newspaper.
• EMROs will not apply on New Year's Eve; this will be a national exemption and this will apply to every EMRO made.
• There will be no exempted category of premises excluded from the ambit of an EMRO. There will, however, be provision to ensure that the supply of alcohol to residents through mini bars and room service in premises with overnight accommodation is not subject to an EMRO. This will not include hotel residents consuming in a bar within the hotel.
• Most Local Authorities were unable to indicate the number of premises which may ultimately be affected by an EMRO.

Late Night Levy (LNL)

• Local residents will not be a consultee in the process of adoption of a LNL but ‘can use their existing rights to make representations and other channels of communication to call for the implementation of the levy in their area'.
• The amount of the levy will be set nationally and is expected to range between £299 and £1493 per premises per annum (or if the ‘multiplier' applies to a maximum of £4,440). See LNL factsheet below.
• There will be a local discretion as to whether to exclude certain categories of the premises from the LNL but the list of possibly exempted premises will be limited. It will include premises with overnight accommodation, theatres, cinemas, bingo halls, community premises, country village pubs (subject to a specific definition) and Business Improvement Districts that operate in the night time economy.
• Proposals to possibly exclude restaurants, casinos with a membership scheme and private member's clubs operating under a club premises certificate were rejected and these categories will not be subject to the local discretionary exclusion from the LNL.
• The levy will not apply on New Year's Eve, but this is indicated to be discretionary (and therefore a matter for individual Local Authorities).
• Reductions in the LNL - Licensing Authorities will be able to offer a maximum 30% reduction from the levy for best practice schemes that meet relevant criteria (for which benchmarks will be set) and for certain premises that are in receipt of Small Business Rate Relief and have a rateable value below £12,000.
• There will therefore be no cumulative discounts from the LNL, enabling any reduction above 30%.
• No further possible exemptions from the levy are proposed.
• Licensing Authorities will be able to fund services (in relation to the supply of alcohol late at night) that are connected to the management of the night-time economy and services that prevent and tackle alcohol-related crime and disorder with their revenue from the LNL. Street cleaning is specifically mentioned as being fundable out of the LNL. Guidance will be issued on this to Local Authorities.

The two factsheets can be found below:

Late Night Levy Factsheet

EMRO Factsheet