Wong Pansy: Sale of Liquor Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
Wong Pansy: Sale of Liquor Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:616;Page:12350] 
PANSY WONG (National) 
: 
 I have tabled three amendments. First of all I welcome the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper with regard to the sale of Chinese cooking wine even though it is very belated. I was upset because that issue occurred in November 2002 and this current legislation was introduced last year. At some time during the first reading I alerted the Minister to the problem it was causing council officials who knew that it was nonsense to ask Asian supermarket owners to remove all Chinese cooking wine from their shelves. Can members imagine advising customers that if they want to buy a bottle of Chinese cooking wine they have to get it from a bottle store? Nobody thinks of going to a bottle store to get Chinese cooking wine. The Minister did not see fit to foreshadow that he would bring in an amendment so all this time store owners and officials have been put under undue stress. 
I point out that when the  
New Zealand Herald 
 ran a story on Chinese cooking wine in February this year it concluded the article by stating: “Police and council staff in greater Auckland were unable to give examples of underaged drinkers being caught with Chinese cooking wine.” I was also interviewed by BBC Radio wondering what was happening in New Zealand that there was such a crackdown on the sale of Chinese cooking wine. Imagine stir-fried beef without Chinese cooking wine! I welcome the Minister’s amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 198 but I wish he had shadowed it a lot earlier so that it would not have caused that stress—and that would have saved me tabling an amendment as well. 
I want to take issue with the Minister about the amendment to clause 13 that I proposed. It was not to do with extending the privilege to other operators. Nowadays we have corporate gift operators and ethnic stores that make up gift baskets for festivals etc. that include a bottle of alcohol. In the past that has been handled by those operators getting an off-licence; that is if the Liquor Licensing Authority sees fit it can grant them that licence. But that practice can no longer happen because of a court decision. The court reckoned that the last amendment to the legislation that Parliament passed provided that supermarkets etc. cannot get an exemption to sell alcoholic beverages other than wine or beer. 
I do not think those other corporate gift operators have that in mind. That is why I proposed the amendment. It was basically to inject back some common sense into the Liquor Licensing Authority—to give it that discretion to allow those small ethnic stores and corporate gift operators to do that. 
My third amendment to clause 21 which I hope the Committee will see fit to support relates to training. The bill repeals section 117A of the principal Act and substitutes new section 117A “General manager must hold prescribed qualification”. Members of the industry informed the Commerce Committee that there was no consultation and the training manual that is now imposed on the industry is draconian. I have tabled an amendment stating that that particular requirement should not come into effect until the content of the qualification has been consulted on fully with the industry. It should also include only the unit standards 4646 and 16705. 
It is time for Parliament to support the industry in trusting it to be able to come up with common-sense solutions. After all we have demonstrated in the last amendments to the legislation that we passed that we did not do a good job with regard to the fiasco over Chinese cooking wine and we have removed a lot of the common-sense discretion given to the Liquor Licensing Authority. I certainly think that the industry as a whole has come to more maturity in terms of knowing what type of qualification and what sort of training is appropriate for it. I hope the Committee will support all my amendments.