Licensing Act 2003 (Mandatory Licensing Conditions) Order 2010

I was going to come to that. The Local Government Association did not in fact support these proposals. However, many local licensing authorities and local authorities did. Somewhere here I have a list of them as long as your arm—from Northumberland to Birmingham. My noble friend Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe cited Brighton and the very large number of licensing establishments in one form or another there. Brighton, however, is not typical, because it is a seaside resort. Brighton has an influx of visitors, both on a holiday basis and for the weekend or for just a day. You could apply the same criteria to Blackpool and a number of other seaside resorts that would not necessarily apply in smaller areas. He talks of the number of inhabitants per licensed premises. In my village, for example, there are 2,500 people and one licensed establishment—the pub—and no off-licence. What we are seeking to do is support that localism because the conditions will change very considerably over the country as a whole. That is presumably why we have a variety of supportive statements from everything from Kensington and Chelsea, Birmingham City Council, Sefton council, Runnymede, Northumbria, Cumbria, Bury—my second favourite football team—Sandwell and Newcastle-under-Lyme. In those terms, we are seeking to look at and ban the extreme ends of the promotions. The noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, asked me if we were banning the yard of ale. The answer is that if the yard of ale is to be drunk in the time determined by the recipient or purchaser of it, that is one thing. If they are in a race to get it down their neck as quickly as possible, that we think is irresponsible. The other basic issue, of course, is that when we produce the guidance, it will be in plain English to make it very clear what will fall clearly on one side and clearly on the other side of what is deemed to be responsible. The guidance will be encouraging those who seek to make a promotion, whether it is a regular one or just a one-off, to first approach their local authorities if they have any doubts. As to the question about age verification in respect of mail order and online sales—like the wine clubs that some of us belong to—the answer is that it will make no difference there. There is a responsibility on the person who is selling the wine to verify that those who are seeking to buy it are over 18. That is normally done because they want you to pay by credit card. But there is no requirement at the present time on the person who delivers the wine. When it is delivered to your house, if your 14 year-old daughter or son signs for it, it will in no way be an issue. Another question related to the licence-holder of the premises and who has the responsibility for the age verification. We believe that that belongs to the person who is responsible for the licence of the premises. Clearly, they will be responsible for their staff, who could be part-time. They will know how to advise their staff, having determined their own policy in line with the order. I believe I have dealt with minimum pricing. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, that the order, with the new powers in the Policing and Crime Act, puts more power in the hands of local people. As I have said, local council members can call for reviews based on the concerns of local residents. On the question of minimum unit prices and cheap supermarket alcohol, I recognise some of those circumstances. That is why what seems to many people to be an esoteric issue is quite serious: people having alcohol poured into their mouths, usually, as the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, says, when they are already inebriated. This can have serious effects on both their behaviour and their health. On the question of forms of ID, we have given a list of those that will need to have holograms. I recognise that there is an industry out there that is always able to produce a fake of something you want to be genuine. There is a limit to how far we can go but our approach is as firm as it can be. The noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, asked several questions, but I was rather disappointed in him today. I have been reading the Morning Advertiser and I know that he has had a survey done. He asked the readers of that august journal to support rejection of the order. I was interested to know what figures the noble Lord had but he did not give them.