The Stage

Sharkey calls for music licensing review

Published Tuesday 5 February 2008 at 14:25 by Lalayn Baluch

Feargal Sharkey has spoken out against the Licensing Act, claiming it was an “error of judgement” to include entertainment within the legislation that has produced no benefit for the UK music scene.

During a public discussion with licensing minister Gerry Sutcliffe, the former chairman of the disbanded Live Music Forum - set up by the government to advise them on the impact of the act - questioned why the future of many young musicians was decided by local authorities who were not “understanding, sensitive, or supportive” to live music.

Echoing the LMF’s final report submitted to the government in June last year, which pushed for major legislative changes to the act including an exemption for small gigs and background music, Sharkey also challenged the abolition of the ‘two in a bar rule’, designed to make performances given by less than two musicians exempt from licensing.

But Sutcliffe responded that the government was taking measures to address to the forum’s recommendations, including investing £500,000 to set up community rehearsal spaces for young people, working with London Mayor Ken Livingstone to protect musical venues and helping universities host musical performances.

He added: “I know there was anticipation of an ‘explosion’ of live music. That didn’t happen and clearly we need to see why that didn’t happen. On the other side of that coin, some people said it would be the end of live music and that didn’t happen either.”

Sutcliffe also said the government was developing a Local Better Regulation Office - an idea first proposed in 2005 - to ensure consistency among licensing officers, who were once branded by the LMF as “heavy-handed” and “over-zealous”.