Consultation On The Liquor Licensing And Public Entertainments Bill 2021

We asked

The purpose of the consultation was to seek views about the draft Liquor Licensing and Public Entertainments Bill 2021.

The present alcohol licensing regime on the Island was recognised to be outdated, overly bureaucratic and inflexible.  The structure of a new piece of licensing legislation was finalised into a draft Bill, following an earlier consultation on the policy behind future legislation, and the opportunity to comment on the draft Bill was provided within the consultation document. 

Additional information about the regime that was likely to be put in places along with possible types of licence and other useful information was provided within the “talking points” section of the consultation document.  The general timelines for the possible enactment of the draft Bill, if it should be successfully progressed, were also included within the consultation document.

You said

The Department received 321 responses, of which –

• 12 were on behalf of an organisation; and,

• 309 were from individuals.

The Department was grateful to the many individuals and organisations who responded to the consultation either by submitting a formal response which was counted in the number of responses above, or by more informal engagement with officers of the Department.

All responses received during the consultation period have been carefully considered, and were valuable in both ensuring general satisfaction with the draft Bill as it was publicly consulted upon, and in identifying some modifications that were needed or might improve that Bill when it was finalised for introduction into the House of Keys.

The Department did received informal views from a number of key stakeholders and interested parties during the consultation period and these parties who either met with officers, or expressed an informal view in writing, were invited to make formal representation in response to the consultation if they wished to do so.  Any views shared informally have not formed part of the summary of consultation responses, but all responses were welcomed and have been carefully considered by the Department in finalising the Bill, and, in many cases, provided additional useful insight or suggested improvement to that Bill.

In the interests of comprehensively summarising the views which were formally provided, along with the main points which have been incorporated into the finalised Bill, a summary of responses document has been generated and made available via a link in the Files section below.

The Liquor Licensing and Public Entertainment Bill 2021 has now been finalised and was introduced into the House of Keys on Tuesday 11 May 2021 for first reading, and can be found on the Tynwald Website