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Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005 - Consultation on Draft Guidance for Licensing Boards and Associated Draft Regulations

Under the terms of the Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005 Ministers may issue guidance to Licensing Boards as to the exercise of their functions under the Act. The Act also requires that before the first guidance can be issued to Boards, it must firstly be approved by Parliament. In order to ensure that all those with an interest can feed into this process we are undertaking a consultation on a draft of the proposed guidance.

In addition to the draft guidance, the Act also allows Ministers to prepare a range of secondary legislation (regulations) on a number of key issues. These regulations also require to be laid before Parliament for approval. In that respect, and to further ensure that all those with an interest can feed into this process, we are also seeking comments on a draft of the proposed regulations.

The consultation paper enclosed with this letter contains the draft guidance and the draft regulations with a short explanatory note on each regulations, on which your comments will be welcome. The procedure for responding to this consultation is set out at Annex A to this letter.

The regulations cover the following matters as: -

• Transitional arrangements;
• Administration procedures for Licensing Boards;
• Training for Licensing Standards Officers & Board members;
• The form & content of the premises licence, summary licence, the operating plan & layout plan & the application form for premises licences;
• The form & content of the personal licence and the application form for personal licence;
• Licensing Board procedure & handling of objections;
• Licence conditions;
• The form of the occasional licence and application form for occasional licences;
• Clubs;
• Exempt premises;
• Training; and
• Underage drinking

This consultation will run for 2 months from 9 October to 8 December 2006. Following this, Ministers will consider the responses and make any necessary adjustments to the guidance and regulations. Both the draft guidance and all the draft regulations will then be laid before Parliament for approval, most likely in early February 2007. A report will be prepared and published setting out the Executive's response to comments raised in the consultation

We do strongly encourage you to submit your comments on this consultation as Ministers are keen that the guidance and the secondary legislation prepared under the Act has the confidence and support of those persons directly affected by the Act.

We would, therefore welcome your comments on this consultation by Friday 8 December 2006. I would also ask that everyone completes and submits the attached respondent information form provided at Annex B when responding to this consultation.

I should point out that in normal circumstances the consultation period would have been 3 months. However due to the Scottish Parliamentary elections to be held in May 2007 we have had to reduce this period to two months in order to meet the deadline for laying the draft guidance and regulations before Parliament early in February 2007.

The Executive will be preparing a further range of regulations on other matters that will include;-

• Training for personal licence holders (including refresher training);
• Relevant offences; and
• Licence Fees.

A consultation will be undertaken on a draft of these regulations in 2007.

Gary Cox
Head of Licensing Team

Annex A: Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005 - Consultation on Draft Guidance for Licensing Boards and Associated Draft Regulations

Responding to this consultation paper

We are inviting written responses to this consultation paper by: Friday 8 December 2006

Please send your response to:

by email:LicensingConsultations@scotland.gsi.gov.uk

in writing:

If you have any queries contact Clare McFadden on 0131 244 1477.

This consultation, and all other Scottish Executive consultation exercises, can be viewed online on the consultation web pages of the Scottish Executive website at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/consultations/seconsult.aspx . You can Freephone 800 77 1234 to find out your nearest public internet access point.

The Scottish Executive now has an email alert system for consultations ( SEconsult: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/consultations/seconsult.aspx). This system allows stakeholder individuals and organisations to register and receive a weekly email containing details of all new consultations (including web links). SEconsult complements, but in no way replaces SE distribution lists, and is designed to allow stakeholders to keep up to date with all SE consultation activity, and therefore be alerted at the earliest opportunity to those of most interest. We would encourage you to register.

Handling your response

We need to know how you wish your response to be handled and, in particular, whether you are happy for your response to be made public. Please complete and return the Respondent Information Form enclosed with this consultation paper as this will ensure that we treat your response appropriately. If you ask for your response not to be published we will regard it as confidential, and we will treat it accordingly.

All respondents should be aware that the Scottish Executive is subject to the provisions of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 and would therefore have to consider any request made to it under the Act for information relating to responses made to this consultation exercise.

Next steps in the process

Where respondents have given permission for their response to be made public, these will be made available to the public in the Scottish Executive Library and on the Scottish Executive consultation web pages. We will check all responses where agreement to publish has been given for any potentially defamatory material before logging them in the library or placing them on the website. You can make arrangements to view responses by contacting the SE Library on 0131 244 4565. Responses can be copied and sent to you, but a charge may be made for this service.

What happens next ?

Following the closing date, all responses will be analysed and considered along with any other available evidence to help us reach a decision. We will prepare a short analysis of responses for publication.

Comments and complaints

If you have any comments about how this consultation exercise has been conducted, please send them to:

Name: Clare McFadden

Address:

E-mail:clare.mcfadden@scotland.gsi.gov.uk

Annex B: Respondent Information Form: Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005 - Consultation on Draft Guidance for Licensing Boards and Associated Draft Regulations

Annex C: The Scottish Executive Consultation Process

Consultation is an essential and important aspect of Scottish Executive working methods. Given the wide-ranging areas of work of the Scottish Executive, there are many varied types of consultation. However, in general, Scottish Executive consultation exercises aim to provide opportunities for all those who wish to express their opinions on a proposed area of work to do so in ways which will inform and enhance that work.

The Scottish Executive encourages consultation that is thorough, effective and appropriate to the issue under consideration and the nature of the target audience. Consultation exercises take account of a wide range of factors, and no two exercises are likely to be the same.

Typically Scottish Executive consultations involve a written paper inviting answers to specific questions or more general views about the material presented. Written papers are distributed to organisations and individuals with an interest in the issue, and they are also placed on the Scottish Executive web site enabling a wider audience to access the paper and submit their responses. Consultation exercises may also involve seeking views in a number of different ways, such as through public meetings, focus groups or questionnaire exercises. Copies of all the written responses received to a consultation exercise (except those where the individual or organisation requested confidentiality) are placed in the Scottish Executive library at Saughton House, Edinburgh (K Spur, Saughton House, Broomhouse Drive, Edinburgh, EH11 3XD, telephone 0131 244 4565).

All Scottish Executive consultation papers and related publications (eg, analysis of response reports) can be accessed at: Scottish Executive consultations ( http://www.scotland.gov.uk/consultations)

The views and suggestions detailed in consultation responses are analysed and used as part of the decision making process, along with a range of other available information and evidence. Depending on the nature of the consultation exercise the responses received may:

• indicate the need for policy development or review
• inform the development of a particular policy
• help decisions to be made between alternative policy proposals
• be used to finalise legislation before it is implemented

Final decisions on the issues under consideration will also take account of a range of other factors, including other available information and research evidence.

While details of particular circumstances described in a response to a consultation exercise may usefully inform the policy process, consultation exercises cannot address individual concerns and comments, which should be directed to the relevant public body.

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