18 November 2010

Liberals to disallow the licensing scheme - Fail

| johnboy
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[First filed: Nov 16, 2010 @ 10:28]

With a new (and widely despised) liquor licensing regime due to kick off next month the Liberals have told the ABC they’re going to move in the Assembly to disallow the regulations which contain the policy settings (the fee structure).

Ms Dunne says the system is a blunt instrument and the Opposition will move a disallowance motion in the Legislative Assembly later this week.

“We don’t believe that the Minister has taken into account a whole range of factors that relate to risk,” she said.

“We don’t believe for instance that the Minister has considered rewarding people who run orderly houses, rewarding people for their good behaviour. He hasn’t considered increasing fees for people who have a poor compliance record.”

Over to the Greens to decide the issue.

UPDATE: The ABC reports that the Greens have voted with the Government to defeat the disallowance motion. Full steam ahead.

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Jack out of the box said :

I feel compelled to step in here on a couple of fronts.

1. The legislative framework
– There is an Act (the Liquor Act 2010), a regulation (the Liquor Regulation 2010), and a disallowable legislative instrument used to determine fees for the Act.
– The Act allows for fees to be determined, the Regulation provides the framework for determining such fees, and the legislative instrument actually provides the value of the fees.
– Dunne attempted to amend the Regulation and moved to disallow the fees instrument.

2. The merit of increasing licensing fees
– Liquor licensing fees in the ACT haven’t been substantially increased past WPI in the ACT for many years.
– Until the new liquor reforms, the ACT had the cheapest liquor licensing fees in Australia. They were substantially cheaper, by thousands of dollars.
– Even with the new fees, the cost is actually quite low and smaller venues hosting live music are not substantially impacted. The old fees instrument is here: http://www.legislation.act.gov.au/di/2010-107/default.asp. The new one is here: http://www.legislation.act.gov.au/di/2010-273/default.asp. For small venues with low occupancy loadings and low annual turnover, the annual difference is about $1000 depending on their trading hours. For larger venues with low trading volumes, the annual difference is at most about $5000. This increase is not enough to “kiss original live music in this city goodbye”. Even at the maximum trading volume of >$3,000,000 in a large venue, the license fee is only $13,661/annum, where previously it was $3,161. This is tiny $10,000 increase represents at most a third of a cent increase for each dollar of alcohol sold.

Irresponsible activity by businesses selling alcohol cost this city massively, in both a financial and social regard. The beat-up coming from business on this isn’t acceptable. It is swaying public opinion to allow for the impending price increases to be blamed on the government, which is just not reasonable. If you want to sell alcohol, you need to be responsible to society for its negative impact.

Define small. The Pot Belly, for example, isn’t considered small under the new regs.

disappointed8:08 pm 26 Nov 10

Small suburban restaurants are the ones that will bear the brunt of the increased costs, not the bars and pubs. A lot of small restaurants and cafes would have alcohol purchases of less than $10,000 a year. Some would be as low as $3000. However, they pay the same fee (approx $2000) as businesses that purchase $100,000 of alcohol a year. And the fee for large venues that purchase up to $3 million is not much greater. As a % of sales, the small operators pay a substantially higher rate.

The new licensing regime isn’t only an increase in the fee, it also involves a substantial increase in compliance cost for small operators while removing some compliance costs for large operators – business with more than 300 customers.

I suspect that as the need to write and maintain “Risk Assessment Management Plans” and the costs of continually training casual staff in RSA courses sinks in, the number of small restaurants and cafes opting out of remaining licensed will increase.

People will no longer be able to expect to get a glass of wine with dinner at their local restaurant. The situation is not good. Small restaurants / cafes already find it hard to compete with their larger rivals and clubs. This change will further skew the operating advantage in favour of big business.

Small suburban restaurants and cafes are rarely the problem with regards to drunken behaviour and violence. Why are they being penalised?

Jack out of the box1:24 am 22 Nov 10

I feel compelled to step in here on a couple of fronts.

1. The legislative framework
– There is an Act (the Liquor Act 2010), a regulation (the Liquor Regulation 2010), and a disallowable legislative instrument used to determine fees for the Act.
– The Act allows for fees to be determined, the Regulation provides the framework for determining such fees, and the legislative instrument actually provides the value of the fees.
– Dunne attempted to amend the Regulation and moved to disallow the fees instrument.

2. The merit of increasing licensing fees
– Liquor licensing fees in the ACT haven’t been substantially increased past WPI in the ACT for many years.
– Until the new liquor reforms, the ACT had the cheapest liquor licensing fees in Australia. They were substantially cheaper, by thousands of dollars.
– Even with the new fees, the cost is actually quite low and smaller venues hosting live music are not substantially impacted. The old fees instrument is here: http://www.legislation.act.gov.au/di/2010-107/default.asp. The new one is here: http://www.legislation.act.gov.au/di/2010-273/default.asp. For small venues with low occupancy loadings and low annual turnover, the annual difference is about $1000 depending on their trading hours. For larger venues with low trading volumes, the annual difference is at most about $5000. This increase is not enough to “kiss original live music in this city goodbye”. Even at the maximum trading volume of >$3,000,000 in a large venue, the license fee is only $13,661/annum, where previously it was $3,161. This is tiny $10,000 increase represents at most a third of a cent increase for each dollar of alcohol sold.

Irresponsible activity by businesses selling alcohol cost this city massively, in both a financial and social regard. The beat-up coming from business on this isn’t acceptable. It is swaying public opinion to allow for the impending price increases to be blamed on the government, which is just not reasonable. If you want to sell alcohol, you need to be responsible to society for its negative impact.

johnboy said :

Regulations (which was how the fee structure was put up) can be disallowed by a motion in the Assembly.

So there was an Act providing the law, and a regulation providing the fee structure? And the Liberals left it till just before liquor licences need to be renewed before protesting the whole shebang?

To be fair to the libs the legislation alone gave little to get upset about. Classic strategy to kill off opposition.

le sigh….guess we can look forward to staying at home now, safe in our nanny state, like good little citizens. 🙁

& I hear Brisbane is nice…

Jim Jones said :

Are the Greens simply a rump of Labor, or will they actually stand up in support of venues which host original live music?

Indeed.

If this gets up you can kiss original live music in this city goodbye as the only live music will be insipid sequenced cover duos/solos playing to brain dead pokie players.

+1

The only thing worse than horrible band-in-a-box outfits is cancer-aids.

I dunno. I reckon cancer-aids sounds pretty good after that crap.

Grail said :

I mustn’t have been paying attention – wasn’t the new regulation already passed, with this bill today simply providing the fee structure?

Regulations (which was how the fee structure was put up) can be disallowed by a motion in the Assembly.

Very poor form Greens.

I mustn’t have been paying attention – wasn’t the new regulation already passed, with this bill today simply providing the fee structure?

pierce said :

Nice strawman. If they know their motion won’t get up – because they haven’t bothered trying to get the numbers to get it up, it’s a stunt.

I thought it was just called “being in opposition” – it’s hardly unusual in the annals of parliamentary history for a motion to raised with no hope of victory.

I guess the recent trend towards hung parliaments has changed our view of how these things work.

pierce said :

If the Libs were serious about this move, they would’ve ensured they had Green support before running to the media. Just another not so cunning stunt.

…that would be even more so amateur for an Opposition to sit back and say nothing, this will not prove to be a sound political tactic by the Greens. I was under an impression they cared about the little guys and the facilities (such as the local pub) that bind communities together…FAIL!

Nice strawman. If they know their motion won’t get up – because they haven’t bothered trying to get the numbers to get it up, it’s a stunt.

pierce said :

If the Libs were serious about this move, they would’ve ensured they had Green support before running to the media. Just another not so cunning stunt.

So unless they have the Greens onside, the Liberals should take no action whatsoever in the Assembly? Or to take it further, if any party is in opposition, they should just keep quiet until the next election.

Got it.

Are the Greens simply a rump of Labor, or will they actually stand up in support of venues which host original live music?

Indeed.

If this gets up you can kiss original live music in this city goodbye as the only live music will be insipid sequenced cover duos/solos playing to brain dead pokie players.

+1

The only thing worse than horrible band-in-a-box outfits is cancer-aids.

If the Libs were serious about this move, they would’ve ensured they had Green support before running to the media. Just another not so cunning stunt.

georgesgenitals7:33 pm 16 Nov 10

stray said :

I truly hope the Greens listen to reason.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

I truly hope the Greens listen to reason.

georgesgenitals2:46 pm 16 Nov 10

As if the Greens will do anything except bend over for their Labor overlords…

Are the Greens simply a rump of Labor, or will they actually stand up in support of venues which host original live music?

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