Sensible PEL fee hits right note

I was discussing transitional arrangements the other day with a licensing officer who, up to now, has been dealing with entertainment licensing.

Being a popular seaside resort, his area has a number of public entertainment licences (PELs) for a variety of venues, and due to the way things have been organised, they renew on the anniversary of grant. Some councils regularise all their PELs to expire on the same day, or on a quarterly basis, but many simply grant for a year from application.

This means, of course, that PELs will expire between now and the second appointed day in November.

He knows, as I do, that they must be renewed, but in many cases it will only be for a couple of months. In some cases it will simply be days.

A PEL will not be required after 24 November. Entertain-ment licensing will be bundled with the main premises licence, and the cost will be covered by the annual licence fee that everyone will pay, whether they have entertainment or not. That much is clear.

But the new premises licence which may already have been granted for many pubs, only takes effect in November. Even though it states that entertainment may be provided, we are still locked into the old system, right up until, presumably, midnight on 23 November 2005.

So, if your PEL expires in the next month or so, you are technically obliged to apply for a new one and pay the licence fee demanded by the council.

This is where I am pleased to say that positive discretion has been exercised at least by this chap. He is charging a proportionate fee for the few months left, rather than charging, as he is legally entitled to, the whole agreed annual fee.

He and I accept that without a PEL the venues could be prosecuted and stopped from running entertainment. So this compromise is seen as a good way of ensuring that they stay legal.

Now I am not privy to the thoughts of nearly 400 local councils on the questions of funds, but I should think that they need every penny they can get.

Let us hope that most of them recognise that to charge the full monty for perhaps a couple of months of permission, given that licensees are already forking out a bruising amount for the new licences, is a tad unreasonable. I hope so.