The ELF is a lay advisory body set up by the City Council as required by the Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005 (the Act). It is not a Council Committee. It does have a separate legal entity. The Council has the legal duty to establish it, to appoint the membership, and to provide support and assistance as required.
The role of the ELF is to keep under review the operation of liquor-licensing in the Edinburgh area, giving advice and recommendations to the Edinburgh Licensing Board (though only on policy not on individual licence applications); to respond to consultation exercises by the Board and by Scot Gov; to consider the implications of relevant data and statistics for City of Edinburgh Council area.
ELF membership comprises:
- A Licensing Standards Officer
- A representative of the Health Board
- At least six trade representatives each holding a premises or personal licence.
- At least six community representatives, one for each Edinburgh Community Planning Area, one to represent Ward 11 (City Centre) and one to represent the EACC
- A representative of the CEC’s Executive Director of Communities and Families to represent young people
- A representative of the Chief Social Worker
- A representative of the Chief Constable
At present the Convener is one of the trade representatives and the Vice-Convener one of the community representatives.
We only three to four times a year, including at least once with the Licensing Board
I have to say that there is rarely any vigorous discussion and things develop at a glacial pace. (We have still not received a full response from the Board to the discussion paper that I submitted in 2024 on the way the Board deals with objections and representations.)
At the moment, I am working on another discussion paper regarding the Board’s response to the Licensing Objectives, particularly the Public Health objective which I don’t think is being adequately addressed.
Roger Colkett, EACC Board Member