However, in spite of the Guidance making reference to this, I have heard of cases where the removal of the 'under 14' rule has been refused by a licensing authority as impacting on the licensing objectives in a standard pub with no special entertainment or adult profile.
The problem is that the decision on whether or not to accept the variation is entirely in the gift of the licensing officer. There is no hearing and no appeal. Even if you are told in ad-vance that it should be OK, if the officer gets any sort of adverse view from elsewhere, he can change his mind and refuse at the end of the consultation period.
Despite the many asurances given at the time of the introduction of the licensing Act 2003, so much of what is wrong with additional entertainment licensing is down to ikes/dislikes of individual licensing officers being set in stone and taken as being the policy of individual licensing authorities.
The Act requires that licensing committees are established to deal with ALL licensing matters. In practice, such committees or sub committees only sit when those employed to enforce licensing set up meetings or hearings for these committees. Matters of policy, such as what locally is to qualify as exempt incidental music, are left to those who are paid to enforce the legislation and not those who are empowered to set policy under it.
John King comments:The Govt's proposal to reform licensing envisages that premises can apply for a minor variation to remove conditions whcih restrict live music. Translated from doublespeak this means they aren't really proposing anything at all.