Yesterday I received the following extraordinary message from Lib Dem Peer - Baroness Hamwee. To my knowledge the same message was sent to at least one other..........

I received your email after the the event, but wanted to reply.

The Liberal Democrats supported the Government's exemption of morris and other forms of folk dancing as well as introducing amendments that enabled the performance of unamplified live music for up to 200 people in places that have a licence to be exempt from needing permission to do this.

Our reason for accepting these proposals at this last stage is that we recognised the Government would probably rather lose the Bill than concede an amendment that enabled up to 200 people to listen to live amplified or unamplified music without a licence.

It appears that the Government may have given us a form of reintroduction of the "two in a bar" rule to enable some form of amplified music to be exempt had we defeated them again, but my colleague Lord Redesdale has campaigned extensively against this arcane measure far longer than the life of the Bill's progress through Parliament so was very reluctant to concede a situation where this would return.

We were very pleased that the Government conceded on the issue of exempting the performance of live incidental music, a Liberal Democrat amendment originally inserted into the Bill when it was first introduced to the Lords, and believe this ensures pianists in restaurants and carol singers at train stations will not need to be licensed.

Thank you for contacting me.

Baroness Sally Hamwee