Reference

BBPA response to Mandatory Code consultation
28.07.2009

Following detailed consideration, the BBPA remains of the view that the Code of Practice is ill-conceived, and that the proposals will result in bureaucracy and cost for businesses without having any significant impact on the issues that the Government is seeking to address.

The BBPA has submitted its own response, in which it labels the proposed Code as “untargeted” and “ill conceived” and has asked the Government to think again about the need for the measure, which will result in more bureaucracy and costs for the trade during acutely challenging times, with 52 pubs now closing every week.

There has also been near blanket opposition to the Code during the Government's series of consultation ‘workshops’ being held across the country. Audiences of police, council officials and licensees have voted strongly against the Code measures in electronic polls taken at the meetings. In Birmingham, 93 per cent were opposed or strongly opposed. At the Nottingham meeting, the figure was 80 per cent, and in Cambridge, 77 per cent.

Licensed premises are still the main focus of Government policy on alcohol, and yet there has never been a greater range of powers available to tackle irresponsible operators. It is time for a change of emphasis. More needs to be done to promote effective partnership working at local level, improved management of public spaces, efficient enforcement, and the responsibility of individuals to behave in a socially acceptable manner.

According to BBPA estimates, the proposed mandatory conditions will cost the pub sector alone almost £58m in the first year, with subsequent annual costs of just over £38m per year. These costs are far in excess of those suggested in the Impact Assessment for all licensed premises, which are given as £28.8m in the first year, with an annual cost of £1.97m after that.

The consultation document recognises that the vast majority of licensed premises are well managed and responsible. However, the proposed mandatory conditions are untargeted and will affect all businesses, placing a disproportionate burden on the responsible majority.

Despite repeated statements from Ministers that the Code of Practice will be enacted in the Policing and Crime Bill, the BBPA urges them to reconsider the need for the Code, and to listen to the concerns expressed in this response and also to those of many local authority and police enforcement officers who have voiced their own objections during the recent series of Regional Consultation Events on the Code.