Jurisdiction(s):
United Kingdom

Related legal acts

Key definition

Licence definition

What does Licence mean? A licence is permission, granted by contract or law, to do something that would otherwise be unlawful, without creating a proprietary interest. In practice, lawyers most often see: licences over land (a personal, usually non‑assignable permission—often a contractual licence—to occupy or use property, distinguished in case law from a lease and generally revocable subject to contract and proprietary estoppel); intellectual property licences (permission to use copyright, trade marks or patents on agreed terms); and regulatory licences. Regulatory use varies across the UK and Ireland. In England and Wales, the Legal Services Act 2007 requires an Alternative Business Structure (ABS) to hold...

Insolvency and premises licences: avoiding lapse, interim authority and transfer under the Licensing Act 2003 (England and Wales)

Published by a LexisNexis Restructuring & Insolvency expert

Practice notes

Liquor Licences for R&I professionals

What is the main legislation governing this area?

The Licensing ACT 2003 (LA 2003) sets out, regulates and controls the provision of licensable activities in England and Wales (separate legislation applies in Scotland and Northern Ireland). Under LA 2003, the activities that require authorisation include the following:

the retail sale of alcohol
the Supply of alcohol by, or on behalf of, a club to a Member of the club, or to the order of that member
the provision of late night refreshment (hot food and/or hot drink supplied between 23.00 and 05.00)
the provision of regulated entertainment (which encompasses music, dancing, exhibition of films, performances of plays, indoor sports events, and boxing and wrestling, subject to various exemptions depending upon the nature and timing of the entertainment, the size of the audience, and whether music is amplified)

Premises licences are issued by the local authority for the area in which the premises is situated and they attach to the particular building/place for the relevant licensable activities being carried on. For businesses operating across multiple sites, there must be a separate licence for each individual premises where licensable activities are provided...

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Jonathan Smith

Poppleston Allen

Jonathan joined Poppleston Allen at the beginning of 1997. After being made Partner in 2002, he succeeded founder Jeremy Allen as Managing Partner in 2006, splitting his time between developing the firm and advising clients. In April 2018, Jonathan handed over the reins as Managing Partner to concentrate fully on helping licensed operators solve their alcohol licensing problems. Jonathan’s advice includes obtaining new premises licences, licence variations and licensing reviews, of which he is a veteran of over 250. To help understand the pressures that people working in the leisure sector face, Jonathan holds five licensing qualifications covering England, Wales and Scotland. Jonathan regularly speaks at conferences and seminars. He sat on the Institute of Licensing’s operational and development committee and has sat on various Home Office and Department of Culture, Media and Sport advisory groups. By request, he was called to give evidence as part of The...

Web page updated on 21/05/2026

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