You would be right, Graham, if the rest of the House of Lords simply said, "Oh, yes, we see that now" to Lord Macintosh's responses. In fact, they are generally unsatisfied with the responses, regard them as inconsistant and say so, but do so using various conventions of politeness. There is still great confusion over what constititutes "the public" for wedding parties for example. An example is given where the death of a well-known local figure is announced in the local paper and people invited to come and pay their respects. Is that open to the public or not?

As far as your other examples are, I would not want a rock band outside my local supermarket at 10pm either. But there are existing noise regulations that can deal with it without the need for anything in this legislation.

My starting point, along with that of many other people, is that noise and health-and-safety issues are a matter for noise and heath-and-safety regulations and there are whole government departments with that as their responsibility: these issues are nothing to do legislation regulating entertainment as such and should not appear to be the prime concern of a department supposedly promoting culture.