Alcohol Licensing (Coronavirus) (Regulatory Easements) (Amendment) Regulations 2021

Considered in Grand Committee

Moved by

That the Grand Committee do consider the Alcohol Licensing (Coronavirus) (Regulatory Easements) (Amendment) Regulations 2021.

My Lords, these regulations contain modest measures to help to support the hospitality industry’s recovery from the economic impact of closures and restrictions on its operation during the Covid-19 pandemic. The measures will help hospitality businesses to recoup some of the revenue they have lost since March of last year. They will also allow greater flexibility in the way in which licensed premises operate if circumstances change.

Data from trade organisations and other sources show significant financial losses for the hospitality industry as a consequence of the pandemic. Curren Goodden Associates, a data and research company, reports that around 6,000 licensed premises closed in 2020 across Britain. The British Beer and Pub Association has estimated a year-on-year decrease in beer sales of £7.8 billion in 2020. Office for National Statistics data up to the end of May this year showed that payments to suppliers from food and drink businesses remained at around half their pre-pandemic levels.

The statutory instrument contains three measures to help. The first will extend provisions in the Business and Planning Act 2020 to allow for a further year, until 30 September next year, sales of alcohol for consumption off the premises to licensed premises that did not have that permission. This will allow up to 38,000 licensed premises that did not have permission to make off-sales when the Act commenced last year to continue selling alcohol for consumption outdoors, to take away or for home delivery.

The second measure amends the limits prescribed in Section 107 of the Licensing Act 2003 to increase the allowance for temporary event notices that a premises user can give in respect of a premises from 15 to 20 and increases the maximum number of days on which temporary events may be held at such premises from 21 to 26, in each of the calendar years 2022 and 2023. The increase in premises allowances of temporary event notices will enable unlicensed premises to host more revenue-generating events, such as wedding receptions and markets where alcohol is sold, as well as enabling licensed premises to extend hours by way of a temporary event notice to accommodate celebratory occasions.

I thank the Minister for her cogent introduction to the regulations and for the copious, detailed, helpful Home Office Explanatory Memorandum. I am sure that all of us seek progress for these regulations. It is so good to see my noble friend Lord Coaker in his Front-Bench seat. I recollect his determination, diligence and command of subject in another place. Can the Minister throw any further light on how previous provisions for Covid have fared in Wales? Was there easy acceptance or did her department detect some resistance? How did her department liaise with and consult the Senedd in Cardiff? Speedily, was it? Or was it dilatory? What form did the consultation take? Was it ministerially, face to face? I think not, from paragraph 10 of the Explanatory Memorandum. Was it official to official? Again, paragraph 10 is specific. Why was it not ministerially face to face? Were there problems? Surely the Minister will surely dispel those considerations. Has the department made any assessment of the differences in the reception of and obedience to the previous post-Covid provisions? What was the link between her department and the department of health? How were these links between departments managed?

Finally, the Committee may know that many decades ago there was a referendum in Wales to determine Sunday opening for public houses. Nonconformist opinion rallied negative forces. The referendum was lost and many remained thirsty on Sundays. I hasten to say that Wales is not a land of hypocrisy and whitewash, but in those days in much of Wales every Sunday there was a procession of buses carrying thirsty Welshwomen and Welshmen to borderland English pubs. Several decades later the second referendum was positive, possibly because the chapels were emptying. I remind the Committee that the great Welshman and Prime Minister Lloyd George enacted legislation that impinged strongly on pub opening times, but the World War I war effort was judged to be the better for it.

My Lords, I thank the Minister for explaining these regulations. I am concerned that the information that she gave to the Committee appears to be somewhat out of date. For example, she gave information about the sale of beer until May this year. Looking at the press, the evidence is that the hospitality sector has recovered extremely well in recent months, what with staycations and people enjoying their newfound freedom. I wonder whether she has any more up-to-date information about why these regulations are necessary.

Of the three measures, the last one is consequential in terms of applications for temporary event notices, and the increases to the limits for temporary event notices are only marginal. My major concern, which we have previously discussed, is about on-licence premises being allowed to sell alcohol to take away. When we discussed this previously, I expressed concern about alcohol being sold in open containers, allowing customers to purchase alcohol and then to walk down the street unsupervised, to the annoyance of passers-by and local residents. Of particular concern was if the alcohol was served in containers made of glass which could be broken and used as weapons.

I note that the Minister said that the National Police Chiefs’ Council—presumably consulted earlier this year—said that there was no increase in crime and disorder as a result of the change allowing on-licence premises to sell alcohol to take away. But that was before the recovery in the hospitality sector that we have seen in recent months. Again, I wonder whether there is a growing problem of disorder as a result of the sorts of changes that these regulations are looking to extend.

The Explanatory Memorandum states that the measures are

“intended to assist the recovery of the hospitality industry in response to the coronavirus pandemic.”

To an extent, that is still a problem as far as city centres are concerned. Although noble Lords and our colleagues in the Commons are back, many offices are still not being occupied in city centres. I can understand that there is a continuing problem for the hospitality sector in city centres, but that is not the case in terms of venues where people live.

It is also a little confusing that Westminster Council, for example, has decided not to grant any more pavement licences from the end of this month, and to reopen roads, particularly in Soho. My understanding is that these regulations are an integral part of pavement licences in that, if alcohol is served by an on-licence premises to people sitting either on the pavement or in the road, that counts as off-sales. Therefore, these regulations are integral to pavement licences if the service provided by premises where there are pavement licences is to include the serving of alcohol. It seems confusing that local authorities are not extending pavement licences—presumably they know better about the concerns of local residents, which is why they are not continuing with the process—yet the Government continue to proceed with these regulations.

The other concern I have is that, as I understand it, the reason why on-licence premises were given permission to sell alcohol to take away—they were given off-licences, effectively—was because of social distancing restrictions, which restricted the number of customers who could be served inside the premises. Now, as we know, all legal restrictions on social distancing inside premises have been removed and, therefore, the main reason for these regulations in the first place seems to have gone. Indeed, as we have seen in the media, nightclubs have reopened, and pop festivals and the like are taking place where you are getting significant numbers of people into very small venues. Again, one has to ask why regulations designed to compensate for the fact that you could not accommodate as many people inside premises are continuing when the restrictions on people inside premises are no longer there.

The whole basis of these regulations is to help the hospitality industry, but at the same time as saying that they want to do that, the Government, according to the Vaccines Minister yesterday, are about to introduce compulsory Covid passports or Covid vaccination proof for entry into many types of premises in the hospitality industry. This would seem to contradict what they are trying to do with these regulations.

It is not simply a case of excluding people who have decided not to be vaccinated, nor simply a matter of keeping people safe. In July in the other place, the Government’s Vaccines Minister said that, by the end of that month, those who had been vaccinated overseas would be able to have a discussion with their GP, and if they were satisfied that the vaccinations that they had received were in compliance with UK rules, the information would be uploaded to the NHS system and people could then access their Covid pass via the NHS app.

This is still not possible, so almost daily I am getting emails from people who have been double vaccinated in Australia or Singapore but cannot access the Covid pass—the same pass that the Government apparently will demand that people have, to access the sort of hospitality industry premises that they claim to want to help in the regulations. It is not simply a health issue of ensuring that people are double vaccinated before they can go into venues. These people have been properly vaccinated yet they will not be able to prove through the NHS app that they have been doubly vaccinated, so they will be barred entry to the sort of premises that the Government are intending to enforce Covid passes for by the end of this month, according to the Vaccines Minister yesterday.

Therefore, I have concerns about whether these regulations are necessary. Local authorities seem to be taking a different view, and I am concerned that the apparent proposal to insist on Covid passes for entering many premises within the hospitality industry will have the reverse effect to what the Government are trying to achieve through these regulations.

My Lords, it is good to be here discussing this important SI. I say at the outset that we support the regulations but, as we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and my noble friend Lord Jones, there are some questions which quite rightly people will want asked. However, I thank the Minister for a helpful introduction, particularly in trying to answer some of the questions before we had asked them—for example, on the consultation with the national police chiefs.

My noble friend Lord Jones got off to a good start by saying how well I did in the other place—so I thought his was a brilliant speech. e made some important points. It is interesting to look at the history of Wales around the referendum on drinking on a Sunday, some of the implications of that and changes that have taken place over the years. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, is absolutely right: the Explanatory Memorandum talked about all the difficulties that there have been, with 6,000 licensed premises closing and over £7 billion lost, but the point of the regulations was to help. It would be helpful, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, was saying, to ask what the positive outcome of some of that was. How many places would have closed and how much money would have been lost had that not happened?

I say to the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, that there clearly is a real problem. You cannot drive around the country without seeing closed restaurants, closed hotels and closed pubs. I am not a statistician but I can see where I live—Cotgrave in Nottinghamshire—that there were two pubs and now there is one, which is working as hard as it can but is facing difficulty. The hospitality industry needs support and help. I accept the point about the need to be positive, particularly as some of the regulations have been relaxed, so what additional benefits are there? That is an important point about why the regulations are necessary and what we say to the public about them. From the evidence of my own eyes as I drive around, I cannot believe that there has not been a disastrous effect. I have a number of questions, as it has made a difference to the industry as a whole.