Home Office States Automatic Off-Licence Provision to be extended

In a letter to the IoL Chairman, Dan Davies, on Thursday the Home Office has confirmed plans to extend the automatic provision for off-sales to licences in England & Wales.

During Covid the Government made several interventions to support the licensed sector including streamlining the Pavement Licence regime.

Complementing the Pavement licence intervention, licensed premises which did not have an off-sale provision on their licence were in most cases given temporary permission to carry on such activity without a formal variation of their licence.

Although we have previously reported about plans to extend the Pavement licence temporarily to September ’23, it was anticipated that the off-sale provisions would expire September ’22 as previously signalled by the Home Office.

In a letter to the IoL Chairman, Dan Davies, the Home Office stated:

“…we had hoped that it would not be necessary to extend these provisions and we duly notified the licensed sector of that intention. However, notwithstanding the absence of legal restrictions, it is clear that the licensed sector is continuing to suffer effects from the pandemic. We have therefore reassessed the situation and concluded that it would be appropriate to extend the off-sales provision for a further year. We will bring the necessary Alcohol Licensing (Coronavirus) (Regulatory Easements) (Amendment) Regulations when parliamentary time allows, with the intention for the regulations to be in force by 30 September.”

We shall keep you updated.