Fri 27th Mar 2015 - Personal licence renewals ‘scrapped’ Personal licence renewals ‘scrapped’: The Home Office has confirmed the abolition of personal licence renewals from 1 April 2015. Solicitor John Gaunt said: “This news, just confirmed by the Home Office, is what operators have been waiting for, for some time and will now avoid the need for personal licence renewals going forward, something which was becoming an increasing headache. Other changes now coming into effect, while important, are of less immediate significance.” The amendments made to the Licensing Act 2003 by the Deregulation Act 2015 (now in force) include: the requirement to renew personal licences has been abolished with effect from 1 April 2015; the offence of selling liqueur confectionery to children under 16 will be repealed with effect from 26 May 2015. After that date a person of any age can buy liqueur confectionery in England and Wales; the requirement to report lost or stolen licences to the police before applying for duplicates will be abolished with effect from 26 May 2015; the limit on the number of temporary events that can be held at single premises will increase from 12 to 15 per year from 1 January 2016. Certain changes to regulated entertainment will take effect from 6 April 2015. The Community and Ancillary Sales Notice and the changes to Late Night Refreshment licensing required secondary legislation. The government ran out of parliamentary time to make the regulations and it will be up to the new government to decide how or whether to take these forward.