Save Live Music

[Michele Monro]

No10 petition to scrap Form 696


Help save live music: please read and sign the petition below.


The 2003 new licensing laws have made it a criminal offense to play or allow music to be played in a public place (parks, shopping malls etc), at the risk of six months in prison and/or a £20K fine. You can however have have a massive TV and sound system in a pub without needing any paperwork or having to jump through all the Health and Safety hoops, public order and childrens' safety, fire regs etc etc etc. all of which were covered by existing laws.

The cost of applying is a minimum £3.5K (8 copies of building plans to be submitted to 8 different council depts) plus the inevitable changes to your premises that will be required by the Authorities ...all without any guarantee that you will get the license after all. It will just take that one old lady that lives 200 yds down the road to complain about the noise. One complaint will be enough.

You can of course sell alcohol 24 hours a day thus helping the Government crusade against excessive drinking. The law has all but killed live music...and now this ... Welcome to the Fourth Reich.

A petition has been started on the Prime Minister's website calling for Form 696 to be scrapped:


http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/Scrapthe696/ <http>


It also states: 'The 696 Form compels licensees who wish to hold live music events in 21 London Boroughs to report to the police the names, addresses, aliases and telephone numbers of performers, and most worryingly, the likely ethnicity of their audience. Failure to comply could result in fines or imprisonment. We believe this places unnecessary and frankly Orwellian powers in the hands of the Metropolitan Police, an institution which does not have the best record of racial fairness. The 696 form can only serve to deter the staging of live musical events - a positive form of activity in London and all cities - stifle free expression and quite possible penalise certain genres of music and ethnic audiences. It is an intrusion too far.'

[Tony Vegas]

Hi Michele,
Has this form been Scrapped now or does it still exist?, As I remember something recently about music licensing being scrapped, (not altogether obviously),But I wondered whether that might be it?
Regards, Tony.