Justice Committee

Meeting date: Tuesday, March 6, 2018

Official Report 622KB pdf

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Subordinate Legislation

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Premises Licence (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2018 (SSI 2018/49)

Agenda item 4 is consideration of a negative instrument. I refer members to paper 3, which is a note by the clerk. If the committee wishes to report to the Parliament, it has to do so by 29 March. Do members have any comments?

Knowing the pub industry quite well, and being aware of the state that it is in, I point out that there is a contradiction in the papers before us. Regulation 2(2) says that an application must provide

“A disabled access and facilities statement ... in the form set out”

by Scottish ministers. However, paragraph 4 of the policy note says:

“the Disabled Access and Facilities Statement does not form part of the premises licence application”.

We need to clarify that. It might be a get-out for traditional pubs that face problems with making adjustments in relation to disabled access, so that they do not have to worry about it, but I do not know. It is something that should be clarified.

The regulations are welcome. It is the best part of a decade since the Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005 was passed, and this move is something that the barred! campaign, which was run by Mark Cooper and Capability Scotland, worked long and hard to secure. It is worth noting that they will be pleased that the regulations will come into force at the end of the month, although I note Maurice Corry’s comments.

I support the regulations, and the move is a good thing, but we need to clarify the issue that I raised.

We have two options. We can seek clarification and return to the issue at a later date or agree to make no recommendations but seek clarification nonetheless. I am entirely in members’ hands.

I think it might be just an issue to do with the combination of the words, but they should be a bit clearer. At first sight, to anyone reading the regulations, there appears to be a contradiction.

I am sure that the intention is clear in the Government’s mind. It is probably just an issue of drafting.

Yes, the regulations need to be redrafted.

I hear what Maurice Corry and Daniel Johnson have said and I agree that we have waited a long time for the move. On the basis that there appears to have been no consultation on the regulations, only discussion of them, I would be inclined to seek the clarification—fairly urgently—with a view to agreeing the regulations once we have it. The worst thing would be that we nod them through and then discover, upon receiving the clarification, that the issue that Maurice Corry has identified is more of a problem than we thought.

We have ample time to seek clarification. Do we agree to that course of action?

Members indicated agreement.

That concludes the public part of today’s meeting. Our next meeting is on Tuesday 13 March, when our main business will be to take evidence on the use of remand in Scotland.

12:45 Meeting continued in private until 12:56.