SOLICITORS representing the Lap Dancing Association are arguing with Bournemouth council on what makes a performance ‘lewd’ or ‘stimulating’.

They have written to the council asking for amendments to the conditions for sexual entertainment venues, which come into force on September 28.

Jeffrey Green Russell say the council’s current conditions, which will regulate For Your Eyes Only, Spearmint Rhino and Wiggle, are too unclear to work.

Councillors meeting at today’s licensing board will now have to debate the finer points on what lap dancers can do and what can be called ‘sexual’.

Bournemouth’s regulations ban dancers from touching customers or exchanging any contact information with them, and also make CCTV coverage mandatory.

The government last year made all councils introduce regulations for the lap dancing industry and all venues must now have a £4,000 license to legally operate.

Solicitor Robert Sutherland wrote to the council, objecting to nine of the council’s 40 conditions, including one that forbids dances from ‘any act which clearly simulates any sexual act’.

He wrote: “The difficulty is that the performance of dance is sexually stimulating by its very nature and there is therefore some simulation of a sexual act even if it with the rhythmic moving of the hips.”

He also objected to a condition that the dancers at the clubs must not use graphic or suggestive language or behave in a ‘lewd manner’.

He wrote: “Lewd, as I understand the dictionary definition, is to be sexual in an offensive way.

“I wonder whether such a condition is necessary as this would be different to different people.”