Government response to booze is piss weak
What a waste of time, this Government have spent so much political capital building up the nanny state monster that they are terrified waking it in the mind of the dumb who believe in it, that's why the long awaited response to our booze culture is such a joke...
Government unveils new alcohol plans
Key changes include:
* A split alcohol purchase age of 18 for bars and 20 for off-licences.
* Banning the sale of pre-mixed RTDs that have more than 5 per cent alcohol or that contain more than 1.5 standard drinks.
* Making it an offence for anyone other than a parent or guardian to provide alcohol to an under-18-year-old without a parent's or guardian's consent.
* Allowing the Minister of Justice to ban alcohol products which are particularly appealing to minors or particularly dangerous to health. This is expected to apply to things like milk-based alcohol drinks or alcoholic ice-blocks.
* Allowing local communities to decide on their own "alcohol plan" with details about the concentration, location, and opening hours of alcohol outlets to be included.
* Default national opening hours of 7am - 11pm for off-licences and 8am - 4am for bars and clubs. Local alcohol plans can over-ride the hours, however, with longer or shorter hours if they wish.
* Changing the definition of "a grocery store" to make it very hard for a dairy to get a liquor licence.
* The proposal for a split purchase age would make New Zealand only the second country in the world to mandate separate ages by premises.
All the Government are saying is 'it's the kids fault' and have structured everything around that, nothing to stop the sale of booze in supermarkets, nothing to increase the price and this Government will continue to allow people to legally drive drunk with a blood alcohol level well in excess of many other developed countries.
Booze plans make youth 'scapegoat'
The Government is using youth as a "scapegoat" in alcohol reform rather than tackling the real problem of New Zealand's heavy drinking culture, addiction experts say. The director of Christchurch's National Addiction Centre, Professor Doug Sellman, said the Government was wrong to see alcohol abuse as essentially a youth problem.
Research found that 92 per cent of New Zealand's heavy drinkers were 20 years and over, and 70 per cent were 25 and over.
"Aiming measures primarily at youth while avoiding anything substantial that would reduce heavy drinking among adults is scapegoating young people for the country's heavy drinking culture and fails to address the main issue," he said.
The Government had avoided the big policy decisions, such as increasing prices and restricting advertising, and ended up with a package that was "like treating cancer with a couple of aspirin".
National are so terrified of being seen as 'nanny state' they are weakening important social policy to make it meaningless. What a wasted opportunity, these changes will do bugger all to reduce the harm booze does to society.
posted by Bomber @ 2:41 pm
7 comments
7 Comments:
nothing to stop the sale of booze in supermarkets
Selling alcohol in a supermarket is a great idea.
It treats adults like adults, and allows us to buy all our shopping at once.
Somtimes, it's not about the kids, but about the adults.
Either you ban it, or just admit that some people have a problem with drinking, and put steps in place for those people who need help.
How is banning RTD's going to stop people drinking so much? After 4 of them and most people vomit before they are drunk.
Making it an offense to buy for underage.....this won't work either because someone will supply, the alternative option is to head to the local gang house for some weed....cheaper, convenient, and thanks to the law, its way cooler to 16 year olds.
Are milk based products seducing our young?...do we have toddlers giving up the nipple for $50 bottles of Baileys?
Who the fuck came up with this shite...is this a big joke?
Alcoholism exists here because its our culture, its socially acceptable and not a youth issue.
For a generation to point the finger at the youth and blame them is stupid. The youth are a product of the previous generation, they live in the world we created.
All their behavior is a learned response, its not something they do and we don't.
I'd rather see these 2 laws:
A ban alcohol sales to over 40 year olds - they have been pissed dickheads for a few decades and will obviously never learn.
Then make it illegal to drink in your own home - this is because kicking the shit out of your loved ones while drunk is something we've been doing for years.
These would be way more effective than whats just been put on the table.
.
Banning RTDs over 5% is retarded. Teenage girls are not buying 9% bourbon and colas and gulping them down like juice boxes. If anything, RTDs with LESS than 5-7% alcohol should be banned. Silly nanny state.
Now instead of being able to purchase a pre-mixed 4 pack (to limit myself, I have a drinking problem) of my favorite beverage, I am forced to purchase an entire 700mL bottle of the stuff and mix it myself. The more I drink the less I can see myself noticing how far past my old limit of four 9% cans I've gone.
Ah well, better start setting aside a bit more cash each week for my habit.
If I want to buy beer at the supermarket, I should be able to, and it's none of your damn business. Stop being such an interfering busybody
Booze is a loss leading product for Supermarkets,
Bullshit.
It is a loss to the producers of the alcohol, who agree to the supermarkets terms.
Supermarkets don't lose a cent on selling alcohol.
I can't allow dirty filthy drunks coming onto this site to spread their dirty filthy booze lies! Booze IS THE LEADING LOSS MAKING PRODUCT CARRIED BY SUPERMARKETS - your attempt to lie about this FACT is a sad indictment of how little your spin can effectively counter this point.
which gives them a vastly unfair advantage and 'normalizes' the booze culture.
"normalises booze culture?
Have you just arrived on this planet?
Supermarkets selling alcohol is treating us like adults.
Have you been drinking in the morning again anon? Supermarkets selling booze in an open aged venue is normalizing booze, that's the impact, simple as that.
What do you profess bomber, that we buy alcohol from tinnie houses?
Again, have you been drinking? Where did I say ANYWHERE in this post that is what I want anon? Booze should be sold in an age restricted venue, I have no problem with adults buying booze, but allowing supermarkets WHO USE BOOZE AS THEIR LEAD LOSS MAKING PRODUCT shouldn't be allowed to sell it.
In short, get your fucking filthy booze out of my supermarket you dirty drunk.
Get your fucking prohibitionist attitudes out of my fucking life, you filthy wowser.
I can't stand angry drunks, they are so ugly. How on earth can you claim I am prohibitionist, I'm anti prohibition but restricted products need to be restricted and the gloriously heavy hand of Government regulation should be used to reverse this bullshit booze liberalization which sees 20 NZers die each week. Getting booze out of Supermarkets where it is THE LEADING LOSS MAKING PRODUCT, lowering the booze blood level that allows so many NZers to legally drive drunk and a hike in booze prices WILL have an impact as opposed to this bullshit 'blame the kids' policy National have coughed up.
You my anonymous drunk friend have been frightened stupid by the nanny state myth, and beefed up on your dutch courage you seem to think it is your 'right' to buy booze at any time in any location.
Cough - Cough this report by ALAC is titled 'Supermarket, loss leading and the relative price of alcohol.
I said cough- cough anonotroll
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