Public Entertainment Licences

Subject: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 08:53 AM

I don't want to go through the history of PELs. I am much more interested in current enforcement policy.

Without naming establishments, for obvious reasons, do most places with live folk music, ie clubs, singarounds, sessions or whatever, have PELs?

Do we have any sense of what local authorities are doing to places that put on live folk music? Do local authorities go looking for places who put on music with out PELs?

I guess their will be massive regional variation but does some pattern emerge?

L in C

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Rasener
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 08:58 AM

Faldingworth Live has a PEL

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST,John from Kemsing
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 09:56 AM

It is my belief here that the council office responsible for it`s implementation have turned a blind eye, having superficially reviewed the circumstances of our "Sing & Play" Evenings.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 10:37 AM

The pub where my current occasional Sunday song/sessions are held is permitted live music on Sundays until 7 pm, under its licence under the Licensing Act (technically not a PEL).

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: The Barden of England
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 04:22 PM

What about if the Premises has a licence and has permitted live music until 7pm on a Sunday, but it is an acoustic session and the premises can hold no more tha 200 - doesn't section 177 come into effect so that the 7pm cut off has no validity?
John Barden

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 07:06 PM

No: it's not a condition of the licence, it's the duration.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST,PeterC
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 07:09 PM

OK, carriage return didn't take me to the next box!

with regard to the section 177 question it really needs a lawyer and probably some case law.

If the licensee put the cutoff into their application then I suspect that it might stand. If the local authority insisted then the question is if that licence term can be ignored of if the licensee has to use section 177 to get it corrected.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 08:12 PM

I am a lawyer. Trust me!

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 06:44 AM

Nice one Richard, I needed a chuckle

Les

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Rog Peek
Date: 25 Jan 09 - 11:46 AM

Yes, that response made me chuckle too

Rog

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST,John from Kemsing
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 09:40 AM

On a not dis-similar vein, the following was told to me by a friend who runs some businesses, one being a workshop where he and three employees work. He has been badgered by mail for some time about applying for a licence to allow his employees to listen to the radio while working and has not responded. He was visited the other day by persons behind the correspondence pointing out he was committing an offence having his radio on in the workshop where anyone in earshot could hear it, employee or visiting customer. He immediately took the radio, cut the plug from the lead, binned the pair of them and, in his own inimitable fashion, requested they leave his premises saying his employees would be allowed to listen on their own personal head sets or car radios. Such was his strongly stated objection to their prescence and his invitation to leave that he was advised "If he carried on like that he could be prosecuted".

    What could he be done for? Verbally abusing a "Jobsworth"?
    If it is about performing rights, could he claim exemption by having only news programmes or Radio 4 talks and plays on?
Have not the BBC already paid the artists fees?

Can somebody tell me what is going on in this country?

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 09:52 AM

The case law supports (or perhaps, "tends to support") the PRS about wireless at work.

The removal of the wireless ends any infringment of copyright by that route.

It does not undo any past infringments.

I cannot envisage any court being likely to accept that it was only talk shows that were on. It would be so unusual.

I am surprised that the word "prosecuted" was used. Normally PRS enforcement for copyright infringment is civil not criminal and one can only be "prosecuted" for a criminal offence. The provisions in the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 ("CDPA") about criminal infringment are fairly hard to read - but are not normally invoked save against knowing pirates.

Perhaps he indicated an intention to assist the expedited departure of the PRS people?

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 10:04 AM

People tend to use 'prosecuted' when they mean 'enforced'... as an employee of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, we are supposed to use the word 'enforced'. Trouble is, most people don't understand what it means and 'prosecuted' has that ring of heavy handed authority about it that makes the average person sit up and pay.

If a radio programme is being broadcast in a public place of business then it requires a license. As your acquaintance was using it in his business premises, then the officers are within their rights to ask him to cease and desist, and take into account any previous infractions of performing rights laws. It does not matter what station, what format or what media - if it can be heard by a member of the public, it is 'broadcast' and subject to those laws.

Performing Rights do not cover just music - someone had to write those scripts, actors had to record those plays and someone had to read that news report. They all count as a 'performance'.

LTS

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST,John from Kemsing
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 10:31 AM

Richard & Liz,
               I am much indebted to you for your succinct and wide ranging explanations. I have, naively, believed all the while that having paid the annual licence fee I, and everyone else was entitled to enjoy the airwaves, the BBC having paid all performers for their contributions. This is obviously not the case and it does now give me a different view of what Public Braodcasting Service is about. I go with tears in my eyes.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 01:22 PM

I don't think I'd go along with all of that, Liz. PRS only enforces rights in its members' works - but unscripted live shows in any event have no copyright scripts

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 01:32 PM

PS - it is however right that the PRS administers rights not only in musical works but also in litereary and dramatic works - it is in their memorandum and articles.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 06:42 PM

I wish the PRS would badger the idiots who pump copyright tunes into my ears whenever I am asked to hold in a telephone call, and the providers of elevator music.

Unless of course it's decent folk music.

Don T.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: MaineDog
Date: 26 Jan 09 - 06:49 PM

RB,
If you want us to believe you, tell us you are a lawyer.
If you want us to trust you, tell us you are not a lawyer.
MD

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 03:18 AM

Yes, Maine Dog, I agree with your second point. It was why I put what I did. Regrettably there are some lawyers that I neither believe or trust.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 03:31 AM

PELs and folk music anybody?

L in C

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: pavane
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 04:12 AM

I don't think it matters for a PEL what kind of music it is. It is a (council) licence allowing music (or other entertainments) be performed in public.

If the music is in copyright then you also need a PRS licence, which is supposed to pay copyright holders their fees for performance. Two completely separate things.

(And another completely separate party is the MCPS, which deals with fees for recording copyright material. Look for the MCPS logo on CDs)

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 04:52 AM

Thanks Pavane, i think I get your point.

When the Law was changed endless threads suggested the collapse of Folk Clubs in the uk. Perhaps this was because Folk Clubs tended to use small rooms in pubs that didn't put on much entertainment at all and so would not need any kind of special license.

My question is have we in general survived PELs and if so is that because of compliance on the part of most pubs or smaller Folk Clubs in smaller rooms just ignoring the problem and carrying on with out PELs?

Do local authorities come looking or is their tacit agreement to let sleeping dogs lie, so to speak?

L in C
No names no pack drill?

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 06:19 AM

I am a bit confused about the meaning of 'public'.
Does it mean that a radio playing in a workshop at the back of a shop, which could be heard by customers buying its products or bringing items for repair, counts as 'public', whereas a workshop on an isolated farm, where the radio would only be heard by people who worked there, or a secure warehouse that members of the public are not allowed in, would not require a licence?
If the only criterion is that a member of the public can hear it, maybe private houses with their windows open require a licence. And what about car radios?

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: pavane
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 07:17 AM

PRS have recently obtained a fee from a car repairer because his staff listened to the car radios in vehicles they were repairing.

They will claim that if it can be heard by a customer (Or any member of the public) then a fee is required.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 07:37 AM

The only case tending to support an argument that the workforce themselves are not the public is a very old one (might be 1909) about nurses, and you know how much judges like nurses!

I think Kwik-Fit took a big fall on the point in Scotland quite recently.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Gedi
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 08:16 AM

I heard something on Radio4 a few weeks ago about having to have a licence (for copyrighted material I think) if you have a radio playing where anyone other than yourself can hear it. This effectively gets any factory where employees (or indeed the company itself) is playing a radio, also it covers shops where staff and/or customers can hear the music. It seems that the authorities who look after these things are clamping down on it, and I know for a fact that the factory where I work has been 'asked' to get a licence to cover such radio broadcasts.

However, the performing of live music in a pub is something different and I'm not sure on the position here. What if all the music played is out of copyright? Therefore there can be no copyright fees due can there?

Ged

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 08:24 AM

That would mean that if I have my radio on in the kitchen and my friend can hear it from the living room I need a licence. And if there are two of us in the room, do we need a radio each?

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 08:26 AM

... and headphones, so we don't hear each other's radio?

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Gedi
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 08:33 AM

I'm no expert but I dont think this applies to households (ie non-businesses). Your TV licence covers you for when the next door neighbour pops in for a cuppa - mind you so it should for the price of it!

Ged

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 08:54 AM

... b-b-but if I don't have a television, I don't have a TV licence ...

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: pavane
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 10:23 AM

TV licence is not related to the PRS licence.

I don't recall seeing anything to say that PRS only covers business, either...

Don't give them ideas!

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 10:34 AM

In any case my home is my workplace as I am self-employed.
Maybe I shouldn't allow myself to listen to the radio while I work.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 11:21 AM

Sorry but ...................

My question is have we in general survived PELs and if so is that because of compliance on the part of most pubs or smaller Folk Clubs in smaller rooms just ignoring the problem and carrying on with out PELs?

Do local authorities come looking or is their tacit agreement to let sleeping dogs lie, so to speak?

L in C
No names no pack drill?

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Nick
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 12:28 PM

The pub I go to most weeks did not originally have a licence but subsequently did when he was visited by the council who had been told about the music by someone in the village (which was very neighbourly)

I believe that Sam Smiths didn't used to in the days when they had music - I know that the one in Farlington near us definitely didn't.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 12:31 PM

Didn't Sam Smiths decide not to have PELs altogether?

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Folkiedave
Date: 27 Jan 09 - 01:24 PM

It wasn't particularly PEL's. It was anything that needed paying for and any kind of licence. That includes Sky, PRS licences, MCPS etc etc. Because there i

Sam Smith's pubs only sell Sam Smith's products. They sell lager, gin, whisky etc made by Sam Smith's.

It has to make some sort of business sense - beer is around £1.30 a pint. (Not a typo for you southerners - one pound thirty pence).

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 28 Jan 09 - 04:29 AM

Dave do you know of any clubs in Greater Manchester that have had trouble with PELs?

L in C

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: meself
Date: 28 Jan 09 - 04:41 AM

Bleak House: The Musical.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 28 Jan 09 - 12:49 PM

Mmmmmmmmmmmmm,

I have puzzled on this "meself", so to speak but don't get much understanding, please help.

L in C

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Folkiedave
Date: 28 Jan 09 - 01:26 PM

Don't know Manchester very well at all. Not for a long time anyway.

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 28 Jan 09 - 02:09 PM

How about Greater South Yorkshire then Dave,

Les

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: meself
Date: 28 Jan 09 - 03:25 PM

Sorry, Les; it was late at night. That was a feeble attempt at a humorous comment on the increasing legal interventions and complications attending the making and broadcast of music ...

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 28 Jan 09 - 03:48 PM

Ah, got it now ........... the brain cell is tired and emotional City 1 Newcastle 0 but who knows.

I am tempted to assume from the responses that PELs have not been the problem that had been anticipated?

Cheers

Les

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 04:11 AM

I am tempted to assume from the responses that PELs have not been the problem that had been anticipated?

Stoke 1 City 0 much gloom.
Cheers

Les

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: eddie1
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 04:40 AM

I notice a brief reference to MCPS (mechanical copying of material) An interesting example of them grabbing you by the short hairs is if you are doing a radio broadcast, Ofcom, who issue the two broadcasting licences required, also require you to record your output and retain it for 42 days. This is so that if anyone should contact them with a complaint about anything from bad language to inciting a riot, Ofcom can ask for a recording of the particular broadcast then make a decision.
OK, you're required as a condition of the broadcasting licence, to record everything therefore you need an MCPS licence to record it. This on top of a PRS licence!

Eddie

ps. Heard a rumour that PRS are looking into the subject of recorded music being played in crematoria. I guess they need a PEL licence as well!

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 05:03 AM

Let me be blunt:

A "friend of mine" is concerned that if he advertises a session in a pub without a PEL the Council will find out and stop the session.

Another "friend of mine" is concerned that a pub with a session might not realise it needs a PEL and if it does it might stop the session.

Please advise my "friend"

L in C

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: The Barden of England
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 06:45 AM

LIC - There is no such thing as a PEL anymore, the Licensing Act 2003 stopped all that. If your friend did not 'tick the box' for licensable activities then I believe he will be acting unlawfully and would be liable to a huge fine or even a 6 month prison sentence. If he did then the 'Premises License' will show that permission and all should be fine. There are others here who know far better than I though so I could be slightly out. Basically if it's not on the 'Premises Licence' then it's not allowed.
John Barden

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 07:06 AM

Thanks Bard,

is the 'Premises License' is easy to access?

L in C

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: pavane
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 07:45 AM

Yes, I think the potential maximum fine is £30,000

Subject: RE: Public Entertainment Licences
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 07:56 AM

I'll get me coat

L no longer in C