Booking a small event on council land

If you're organising a small-scale event or activity, you may be able to use our activity process rather than submit a full event application.

Activities are classed as:

• small-scale events which have minimal to no infrastructure
• having short time scales - a couple of hours maximum
• involving a maximum of 50 people
• having no impact to the site
• do not require any other licensable activities

Activity requests also cover boot camps and forest schools.

All activities must have a risk assessment and public liability insurance.

Fill in the enquiry form on the Event App website and tell us whether you are applying to hold an activity or event. You'll need to sign up or log in to your account. 

If you use our land, property, or facilities, you must submit a risk assessment. The risk assessment must be site and activity-specific and cover all equipment that will be used as part of the activity.

If you are using our land, property or facilities, you must arrange public liability insurance with at least £5million in coverage. The insurance must cover the entire length of the activity.

You’ll need to ensure that any third parties, such as contractors and entertainers, also have their own public liability insurance with at least £5million cover.

You’ll need to send proof of your cover and that of any third parties to our activities teams with your application form.

If you want to include third party risk under your own insurance, you’ll need to send us written confirmation from your insurers.

You will need to pay a fee to hold an activity at one of our sites. Fees are split into four categories and are priced on a sliding scale:

• commercial activities, such as boot camps or forest schools, and organisations that are generating income for their business
• charities and community groups who are charging entry or raising money for organisations
• activities being carried out with a direct community or environmental benefit for the site
• activities which fall outside this structure – price on application

Payment is required for the use of all of our land. Please ensure you are fully aware of all relevant costs when you submit your application. 

You will be asked to pay your activity fee before we issue a licence to occupy.

At some locations, electric pillars may be possible. However, this will require additional costs, and it is subject to availability on-site and the discretion of the activities team.

A site hire permit, also known as a licence to occupy, will be granted when the application has been approved.

It is important to note that a site hire permit is permission to occupy the land for your proposed activity and is different from any licensable activities such as street trading.

Any and all conditions applied to the permit must be adhered to.

Where possible, an activity application site hire permit will be valid for one year as long as the activity is the same on all occasions.

Different activities from the same activity organiser will be subject to individual fees and applications.

Site hire permits are issued for one site. Multiple sites will be subject to different applications and fees charged per application. For example, one boot camp provider operating on more than one park will be charged for each park.

Promotions and activities which are not described in this section are subject to a different fee structure. You can contact our seafront and activities team to discuss this.