The Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 requires local authorities to licence and regulate various types of business from street traders and taxi drivers to second hand dealers and public entertainment events. One of the lesser known classes of licence is that of the metal dealer – but the spotlight has been firmly on this industry in recent weeks and months following the increasing number of metal thefts. According to the Scottish Government there have been 1500 incidents in 2011 so far and there have been some high profile incidents including the theft of war memorials and in one incident in the south side of Glasgow a power cable was cut, leading to some 40,000 residents going without power. A bizarre example is that some 125,000 shopping trollies have been stolen from Glasgow and Edinburgh (although presumably not all at the same time!). The cost to the UK economy has been estimated at £220million to £260million.
Kenny MacAskill, the minister in charge of licensing, has been moved to respond to all this by proposing a tightening of the existing legislation surrounding metal dealer licensing. At the moment, there is an exemption by way of an application for a special warrant to the local authority if the business has a turnover greater than £100,000. New proposals released on 29 November 2011 (The Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 (Metal Dealers’ Exemption Warrants) Order 2012) would see this rise to £10million. The immediate effect of this will be a large increase in the number of business “caught” by the licence requirement and if this change is brought forward, I would expect there to be a long-stop date by which affected businesses would need to lodge a metal dealer licence application. There is no clear view as yet as to how many businesses would be affected by this.
Metal dealer licensing is one of the most esoteric forms of civic licence perhaps because there are so few licences issued. That looks set to change. Interestingly, the proposals (as they stand) do not consider the separate licence known as the “itinerant metal dealer” licence, which is required for persons dealing in metal but without a fixed business premises. The regulation of itinerant metal dealers is fairly relaxed compared to the “full” licence, with far less demanding requirements on record keeping for example. It remains to be seen whether a tightening up of these regulations would also help tackle the problem, but as it stands this is not on the Government’s radar.
Metal dealer businesses currently exempt should familiarise themselves with the terms of the new proposals, and consider how best to navigate the licensing process.
If you think your business could be affected by this please contact Stephen McGowan for more information.
