Policing and Crime Bill

My Lords, I have three amendments in this group, relating specifically to the transitional arrangements that the Government intend to apply to existing venues, and to the length of licence that a local authority will be able to award to a venue. Amendment 42 was tabled in Committee. I have returned to it to allow the Minister to give us a little more detail than he elected to do then. Many owners of relevant venues are extremely concerned about their long-term investment in premises. We have heard from many in the industry who feel that the Government are being far too dismissive about the cost to owners of defaulting on loans that were taken out on the assumption that their licence was safe for several years, and the cost of being forced to convert their premises to other uses. I hope very much that the ongoing consultation on transitional arrangements will be a genuine attempt to take the industry’s concerns into account, and that any representations will be seriously listened to. Amendments 45 and 46 go in a rather different direction from the amendments of the noble Baroness, Lady Gould. Like my noble friend Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, we would prefer to see local authorities given more flexibility, not less. There will be plenty of local authorities in this country for whom these provisions will be entirely unnecessary. Even where there are some relevant venues within a local authority’s area, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that planning restrictions and general good sense can, and do, prevail when there are no objections to their continuing. I therefore would like to see local authorities able to decide whether these potentially expensive and bureaucratic provisions are strictly necessary in their area, and whether they feel they have to go through the rigmarole of licence renewal every year. The noble Baroness, Lady Miller, has tabled an interesting amendment with regard to exemption for infrequent use and I look forward to the Minister’s response. In the mean time, I take the opportunity to probe him a little further on the power in sub-paragraph 4 of new paragraph 2A in Schedule 3 to the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act for the national Government to amend the monthly exemption. Under what circumstances would this power be used? Surely such discretion would be better left to local authorities which would be better placed to know whether the current legislation is causing them problems. Finally, I would like to comment on the government amendments in this group. The noble Lord has moved a very small way and at least has addressed the implication of contact in the term "encounter". However, it was the reference to sex that women working in this entertainment industry most objected to. It is disappointing that the Government have not appreciated this. It is very hard not to feel sympathetic to the dancers. Since a film must show, ""clear images of real sex, strong fetish material or very strong sexual images"" before it is considered necessary to slap a restricted rating on it and remove it to a cinema licensed under the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, it appears that in many cases, if the dancers were performing in a film, it would lead to, at most, an 18 certificate from the British Board of Film Classification. Of course, not all clubs providing this sort of entertainment are safe and legal and I have to agree with the wish of the noble Baroness, Lady Gale, to improve the law to ensure that dancers are kept as safe as possible. I also agree that the location, number and type of clubs offering erotic dancing is a matter in which local communities should have a say, but I do not see how labelling dancers as sex workers will achieve either of these things.