Something which really intrigues me is how Scotland went from the most restrictive licensing laws in the UK to the most liberal in the 1970s.
I was dead jealous when my school friend Henry, who studied in Aberdeen, told me of pubs not only staying open all afternoon, but until 1 AM. All totally legal. And totally due to the interpretation of a new Licensing Act for Scotland. Which, I'm pretty sure, wasn't intended to liberalise opening hours to the extent that it did.
If there had still been a large, organised temperance movement, I'm sure that they would have put pressure on magistrates not to grant longer opening hours. If they weren't already on the licensing bench already.
I can remember visiting Edinburgh in the late 1970s and wondering at the continental-style opening hours. And wondering why the same liberal treatment couldn't have been given to the rules in England. It wasn't until the 1990s that a similar regime was introduced in England.
The relevant legislation that prompted this revolution in allowing punters to buy a pint at 4 PM was the Licensing (Scotland) Act of 1976.
One provision, which I’m not sure was acted on, was like a return to beer houses. Because it gave licensing authorities the power to forbid the sale of spirits. Which is a bit odd as this is around the time beer house licences were being wound down
The real surprise though, is the list of permitted alcoholic drinks.
29.- (1) A licence granted under this Act by. a licensing board shall authorise the holder thereof to sell by retail spirits, wine, made-wine, porter, ale, beer, cider, perry, and any other alcoholic liquor:
Provided that the licensing board may, when granting a licence or an application for an extension of the permitted hours, restrict the alcoholic liquor which may be sold thereunder to wine, made-wine, porter, ale, beer, cider and perry.
(2) Where by virtue of a decision of a licensing board under the proviso to subsection (1) above only alcoholic liquor other than spirits may be sold, it shall be an offence for the licence or his employee or agent to sell spirits.
Why on earth was the Act mentioning Porter by name? When there probably hadn’t been any sold in Scotland since the 19th century.
The legislated hadn’t been intended to extend opening hours. But in a remarkable display of common sense, the licensing authorities were very generous in interpreting the provision for granting permanent extensions to permitted hours. Soon, longer hours were the norm in Scotland.
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Historically it’s been quite common for laws of the social engineering type to be implemented in Scotland first with England and Wales waiting to see what happens – recent examples are the smoking ban and minimum pricing.
I don’t remember the liberalisation of opening times in the 1970s but I do remember when I was a teenager that supermarkets weren’t allowed to sell alcohol on Sundays. This was a bit of a bummer for me as we usually did our big shop on a Sunday and I would otherwise be trying to get my mum to buy me a few imported lagers.
I’ve also seen the licensing regime tightened up again more recently with the introduction of Challenge 25 etc. Both the liberalisation and tightening were explained with the same arguments, that we were a nation of terrible pissheads and the change would help us be a bit more civilised.
Glasgow licensing board is still incredibly tight-arsed. One of our local microbreweries wanted to have a few open days over the summer, where people could come along, see the brewery and have a beer. He had to cancel them all because he was refused a licence.
Interesting Rob Ireland used to have very restrictive opening hours no doubt thanks to the pioneers and prior British rule thankfully not as absurd as Finland or the Nordics with the exception of Denmark or Australia with the one hour opening in the evening. Though in Ireland especially Dublin there was a loop hole in getting a drink later at night than normal https://comeheretome.com/2014/02/14/bona-fides-kips-and-early-houses/
https://oldskerries.ie/bona-fide-traveller/#:~:text=To%20be%20a%20bona%20fide,to%20have%20the%20right%20intention.
https://www.gardahistory.com/john-cunningham-bona-fide-travellers-law/
Reply to Rob written by Oscar.
I've had a lawyer friend explain these redundant lists in laws and contracts tend to be CYA stuff to make things explicitly clear, in case someone cheeky came along and (in this situation) sued a pub for serving Porter when the law says beer but not porter. IIRC someone tried to use this ambiguity to challenge a law about playing poker in the UK in the 2000s. Surely there's a lawyer out there who can say more.
Oscar, we had the bona fide traveller thing in Scotland too. People would take the tram to just outside the city boundaries to enjoy a drink in another burgh.
Interesting that Ireland kept in step with Britain in some ways for so long after independence. Switching to decimal currency at the same time, for example.
I saw that BBC documentary about the day trip steamers on the Clyde and they were saying their popularity was in part due to being able to get a drink on a Sunday as everyone on the boat was a bona fide traveller.
The Punt or Irish pound was pegged to the Pound Sterling until 1979.
My Great Grandfather worked as a bar man between 1935 and the 1980’s/1990’s and likely encountered such characters as he worked in a suburban town pub.
Oscar
One legend, which I am not sure I believe, is that these Clyde steamers are the origin of the Glaswegian use of the word steaming to mean drunk.
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