If you've been to some places with PELs - such as discos and music pubs with nightclub licences - and I have because of my daughter's slightly metallish, grungeish, skatepunkish band - you'd know why PELs were required to enable public music performances to be regulated.

It would not be workable to define folk music for this purpose (hel, look what happens when we try to define it here), indeed look at the mess the UK gov't got into trying to define "raves" in order to ban them. THeir definition probably catches a performance of Ravel's "Bolero".

If you want to persuade the govenrment to change the law you need to knw very clearly indeed how the current law works, and even more clearly how you want to change it and what the effects will be. I went through a very long process a few years ago trying to persuade teh govt to change copyright law in order to protect TV programme formats - which a number of foreign countries' laws do, so I have some idea just how bloody minded some bureaucrats can be.

Ken Livingston may be the best bet. Rumour has it he likes Irish music.