Hansard

I am happy to open this stage 1 debate on the Air Weapons and Licensing (Scotland) Bill.

I thank my colleague and predecessor Kenny MacAskill, who brought forward the bill last year. I also thank the Local Government and Regeneration Committee, the Finance Committee and the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee for their work in considering the bill.

I was pleased to note from the Local Government and Regeneration Committee’s report that it supports the general principles of the bill, in particular the licensing of air weapons. I am grateful to that committee for the manner in which it took evidence at stage 1. It invited a wide range of stakeholders to give evidence in the spirit of drawing out changes that will, in line with the aims of the bill, best improve the relevant licensing regime in Scotland. The evidence and the committee’s report have been extremely valuable in helping the Government to reflect on whether we can make further improvements in particular areas, and the committee will have seen my response to its report.

I am pleased to be able to update the wider Parliament by providing an overview of the bill, which is in four parts. Part 1, which covers air weapons, sets out a new licensing regime for air weapons to be administered by Police Scotland. Part 2, which covers alcohol licensing, amends the existing licensing regime for alcohol licensing that is included in the Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005. Part 3, which deals with civic licensing, amends the existing licensing regimes included in the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982. Finally, part 4 sets out general provisions.

I will look at air weapons first. The licensing of air weapons has been on our agenda for quite some time. Our 2007 manifesto set out plans to tackle that, and we reiterated that aim in our 2011 manifesto. Following the Calman commission’s report in 2009, responsibility for the regulation of most air weapons was devolved in the Scotland Act 2012. Kenny MacAskill introduced the bill having chaired a firearms consultative panel of experts and carried out a wider consultation on the principles of licensing.

The aim has been to set out a regime that parallels existing firearms legislation where appropriate and is therefore familiar to the police and to shooters, but which is relatively light touch in its practical application.

The Local Government and Regeneration Committee suggested a few amendments in its stage 1 report. I have already responded to those recommendations, but I would like to mention a couple of the most prominent issues.

The first relates to Police Scotland and the need to smooth the transition workload for the work that it will undertake for the introduction of the licensing. Officials are still discussing that with the police to ensure that the impact of the new regime is minimised as far as possible. We are considering whether that is best achieved by way of an amendment at stage 2 or through regulations under the bill.

The second issue is the proposal to add some form of identifier mark to air weapons to support the certificate system. The Scottish firearms consultative panel agreed at a very early stage that it would be appropriate to license a person rather than the gun itself, and continuing discussions with stakeholders, including Police Scotland and the Gun Trade Association, confirm that there is little or no support for a proposal to mark weapons individually. Such a move would place immense additional burdens on the police, the trade and shooters while doing little to help tackle criminal misuse of air weapons. As a result, I do not intend to lodge at stage 2 amendments to introduce an identifier mark.

On the bill’s alcohol licensing provisions, it was made clear in the consultation that people do not want a root-and-branch review of alcohol licensing legislation. However, certain areas are not working as effectively as they should be and, instead of proposing a radical overhaul of the regime, the bill examines those areas to find ways to improve the existing system. For example, the bill will take forward a commitment made in the 2011 Scottish National Party manifesto and create new offences of giving alcohol or making it available to a child or young person for consumption in a public place. That will allow Police Scotland to address the problem of the drinking dens where vulnerable young people can congregate to share alcohol.

The bill introduces a fit-and-proper test for both premises and personal licence applications, and licensing boards will also be able to consider spent offences. Those changes have been widely called for and will assist licensing boards in ensuring that only those who are fully appropriate can hold such a licence.

With regard to licensing board practice, we have clarified that an overprovision assessment can relate to an entire board area and can take account of licensing hours. We have also considered statements of licensing policy. Despite some very good practice at board level, such statements often fail to have the strategic impact that we had hoped, and as a result we are amending policy statements to ensure that they align better with local government elections. Such a move will encourage a new board to take stock, gather evidence and set a policy statement that reflects its own views and aspirations.

The bill contains a number of fairly technical amendments. For example, it amends the final licensing objective to include young people alongside children. The distinction between “children” and “young persons” can create difficulties for licensing boards in dealing with issues relating to young persons and can mean that issues involving 16 and 17-year-olds cannot be considered in relation to the protecting children objective. The amendment in the bill ensures that licensing boards have the power to consider such issues as part of the licensing objectives. There are also a number of provisions that should be welcomed by the trade, such as the removal of the five-year ban on reapplying for failure to render a personal licence refresher training certificate and the imposition of a duty on boards to report on their income and expenditure.

The bill improves the effectiveness of civic licensing regimes with a variety of reforms across a wide range of areas. For example, the bill will tighten up the licensing of metal dealers to ensure more effective regulation of the industry and to make it more difficult for metal thieves to dispose of stolen metal. It will deliver that objective by ensuring that all dealers are licensed, banning the use of cash as a payment for scrap, tightening record-keeping arrangements and requiring proper identification of customers.

The bill will allow communities to have a greater say over whether lap dancing takes place in their areas by giving local licensing authorities the power to control the number of licences for sexual entertainment venues in particular localities. Central to that proposal is the belief that local communities should be able to exercise appropriate control and regulate sexual entertainment venues that operate within their areas. Local licensing authorities are best placed to reflect the views of the communities that they serve and to determine whether sexual entertainment establishments should be authorised and under what conditions.

The bill simplifies the licensing of theatres by merging it with the public entertainment licensing regime, which will allow some theatres that currently have two licences to operate with a single licence. In addition, the new licensing regime will be more flexible, in that it will replace mandatory licensing with a discretionary system that will allow local licensing authorities to exempt smaller theatres if they so choose.

The bill also aims to bring greater consistency between and within taxi licensing regimes and private hire car licensing regimes. Local authorities are responsible for the taxi and private hire car licensing regimes. They have discretion in applying a local regime that best meets the specific requirements of their local area and can take account of the views of customers and the trade. In general, that local process works well, but we are aware that there have been a number of concerns about the taxi and private hire car licensing regimes for some time. Those concerns were highlighted by stakeholders during informal discussions and were further reinforced during the public consultation exercise.

Specific provisions in the bill include the power to refuse to grant private hire car licences on grounds of overprovision; the extension of driver testing to allow testing of private hire car drivers; and the removal of the contract exemptions from the licensing and regulation of taxis and private hire cars, which will bring hire cars that are used on contracts into the regime.

In part, the provisions acknowledge that, in parts of the country, taxis, private hire cars and contract hire cars are essentially operating in a very similar market. Some of the distinctions that have been made between their modes of operation—for example, the distinction between pre-booked cars and vehicles that use ranks or can be hailed—have been blurred as a result of changes in technology.

In addition to the amendments to specific regimes that are covered by the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982, the bill includes provisions that will have effect across the licensing parts of the 1982 act, the aim of which is to create greater consistency and clarity in the licensing regime.

The bill includes a number of provisions that are aimed at improving the operation of all civic government licensing regimes and clarifying compliance with the European Union services directive. Specific provisions include giving the Scottish ministers the power to make provision for the procedure to be followed at or in connection with hearings.

The bill introduces a new role—that of civic licensing standards officer. Civic licensing standards officers will have broadly the same powers and duties that authorised officers have under the 1982 act, but they will have specific functions in relation to providing information and guidance, checking compliance, providing mediation and taking appropriate action on perceived breaches of conditions to a licence that has been provided under the 1982 act.

I have set out the Government’s thinking on some of the key areas of what is a wide-ranging bill. I look forward to hearing the views of colleagues and to working with the committee as we continue with the bill’s passage through Parliament.

I move,

That the Parliament agrees to the general principles of the Air Weapons and Licensing (Scotland) Bill.