Clause 96
Licensing Bill [Lords]
8:55 am
Mr Mark Hoban (Fareham, Conservative)
The hon. Gentleman has a valid point and I understand the angle that he is coming from. However, if we examine the relatively small number of temporary event notices that a premises is allowed, it will not take long for a village hall to exhaust its five notices if it wants to put on a range of activities. I would much rather that the operating statement were drafted more widely to allow village halls to say, ''From time to time, we will sell alcohol for particular events and we may put on plays and musical performances to reflect the needs of the local community.'' I would rather that we went down that route than enable some operators to use a system of temporary event notices to circumvent public scrutiny of their activities.