Licensing Act

My hon. Friend is a great expert in contemporary music, and is as familiar with Tinchy Stryder as I am. Master Stepz was also involved. Those are major performers, but on that occasion the police expressed concern that the combination of those artists and the fact that the promoters were young contributed to the possibility of the event attracting public disorder, so it had to be cancelled. The second event was the Black Comedy awards, which was not even a music gig. One day before the event, the police said that they had received intelligence that gang members would attend and some of their names were spotted on the guest list. The O2 did not want to risk the police closing the event in the middle, so it decided to postpone it, and the promoter lost £12,000 as a result. Another event involved Rick Ross, a black rap artist from New York. Form 696 was submitted within the time frame, and the police said that it was a low-risk event, but when the guest list was submitted the day before, it raised concern with the police to the extent that they requested that it cancelled. The O2 resisted, and pointed out that it was the fourth event in six months that had followed a similar trend—that attracting a black crowd raised concerns with the police. The O2 pointed out that it operated a high level of security with random searches on entry, had its own policing and was confident that the event would be secure. Only after intervention by the council leader and the Metropolitan police borough commander was it allowed to take place. It passed off with no problem at all. However, the O2 points out that such things are a having a significant effect on it. If they are affecting the O2 to that extent, they will plainly be affecting many other venues. The Minister should be concerned about this. I quite accept that the Metropolitan police are not operating these provisions on the grounds of racism, but there is no doubt that that they are looking at specific types of music. Originally, as he will know, the form required the identification of the type of music to be performed. That requirement has since been removed, but it is still widely believed that the form is being used to target black music events, and that is causing deep resentment among certain communities. The Minister will be aware of the importance at the present time of not alienating certain minority communities, and the form is a cause of resentment. I therefore hope that he will talk to the police and look seriously at whether it really is necessary to have the form at all. The Select Committee's view was that the form was unnecessary and unjustified and that it should be abolished. I want to touch briefly on one other issue that the Committee examined as part of its consideration of the Act. The licensing of lap-dancing clubs has been subject to legislation, and a new category has been created, so lap-dancing clubs can be treated as sex-encounter venues. The Committee's view was that it was not right that local residents living next door to a normal nightclub or bar should wake up one morning to discover that it had turned into a lap-dancing club and that they could do nothing about it. We felt that there was a case for a separate category that would allow local residents to express a view as to whether a location was appropriate for a lap-dancing club. Equally, a number of the people who gave evidence to us wanted to ban lap-dancing clubs completely, but we were of the view that such clubs are a legitimate and legal form of entertainment, which some people enjoy. We were concerned about one or two aspects of the new provisions, particularly where owners have invested large sums to establish clubs in locations where there has been no record of disorder. Indeed, the Lap Dancing Association made the point that lap-dancing clubs are probably some of the best policed and secure venues and have less of a record of public disorder than almost any other type of entertainment venue. Nevertheless, they are required, for instance, to renew their licences annually, which makes it difficult for them to have security about their long-term investments. We could not see that annual renewal was necessary, and if there is a problem, there is always the provision allowing local residents, the police and others to make representations about the licence. The automatic annual renewal requirement is, therefore, not necessary. We also had concerns about the transition to the new regime. We believed that existing clubs should have quite a lengthy period—perhaps five years—before they have to meet the full licensing requirement. Those remain concerns, and I hope that the Minister will briefly touch on them. As I said, our overall impression was that the Act had achieved a large part of what it was intended to achieve. However, there were real concerns about specific provisions, and the Committee was disappointed that the Government did not seem willing to address them. I hope that the Minister will correct that this afternoon.