Name the day, DCMS, and ease fees misery

One of the main planks of the new licensing policy, as I seem to keep having to remind administrators, was to remove red tape, not add to it.

A succession of licensing ministers read a succession of prepared statements, all saying how the old system was a bureaucratic nightmare and the new one streamlined and proportionate. Even new boy Shaun Woodward was briefed on how people would queue up for hours to renew their licences at the magistrates' court every three years, and how much paperwork there used to be.

Renewals were to be abolished. That would save hundreds of thousands of man hours at a stroke. There would be precious little, administratively, for the licensee to worry about.

Well, his comparison was totally out of date and unfair. Renewals for several years had been dealt with administratively, every three years, usually by the issuing of a single-page letter, to which the licensee would respond with a signature and a cheque for £30. That's as hard as it gets. No queuing, no wasted man hours.

Currently, the new system replaces that one with, hopefully, a single-page letter, inviting a cheque for considerably more than £30, but it comes every year! There's progress for you, boyo!

The only current debate seems to centre on when the cheque is due. One website I plugged into commented that there was "confusion" about the issue. I see no confusion: I see some people reluctant to pay, but that has always been the case with the licensed trade, hasn't it?

The Act and the regulations are pretty clear. The Act says regulations may require the holder of a premises licence to pay an annual fee.

The Licensing Act 2003 (Fees) Regulations state clearly the annual fee "shall become due and payable each year on the anniversary of the date of the grant of the premises licence."

So the law itself is not in question. But there are two elements to all of this which help to muddy the waters.

The first is some controversy over the so-called "date of grant", especially of licences which have not been issued yet (really?) or were granted by default. The second is the local authority attitude - a debt may be "due and payable" without being enforced. To these can be added a third element - the fact that the Department for Culture Media & Sport (DCMS) is clearly toying with the idea of having one universal payment date for the fees, so that everyone knows when the money is due.

(By the way, note that the fee is payable by the holder of the premises licence. There have been suggestions that it is being implied that the tenant or lessee is automatically responsible. Not unless there is a contract stating as much).

The actual date of grant ought to be stated on the licence. But I received one "default" licence in March of this year which was dated 30 September 2005.

There is no chance that I can challenge that, because conversions technically were "deemed to be granted" two months after submission.

There is, however, a bigger question mark over licences which were subject to representations and then possibly appeals. Their actual date of grant may be considerably later.

There is no doubt that local authorities have reacted differently. Some have sent out reminders when the computer tells them to, but have done nothing else.

As far as I am aware, not one of them has started debt recovery proceedings, but it must be stressed that, as the law stands, the licensing department can simply shift over outstanding ones to the general council debt enforcement people who will come round in their van.

Again, if there is to be a universal day, then now is the time to announce it, to save a lot of stress. Are you listening, DCMS?