Catchpole Brent: Customs and Excise (Alcoholic Beverages) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Third Reading 
Catchpole Brent: Customs and Excise (Alcoholic Beverages) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:608;Page:5395] 
BRENT CATCHPOLE (NZ First) 
: 
 We are led to believe that this bill is not another tax. When we see a tax that is 84 percent that is a colossal tax. Jim Anderton claims that this will reduce the amount of alcohol consumed by young people; his Government is very naive if it believes that. The alcohol that the Government is to tax will not affect young people at all. I have in my hand here a bottle of Vodka Cruiser. It happens to be the passionfruit version. The total volume percentage of alcohol in this bottle is 5 percent. It falls outside of the limits of this bill. This is one of the most popular drinks for young people. Ron Mark has a pile of bottles in front of him. There is KGB Vodka and Vodka Teaser both of which have 5 percent alcohol. How will this bill stop young people from drinking? By increasing the price of the higher-valued alcoholic drinks? That will miss the mark. This bill will miss the mark because young people are not interested in the higher-alcohol sherries or ports. They would be laughed out of the pub by their mates if they walked in and asked for a port. They would be laughed out of the clubs if they walked in and asked for a sherry. 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: No there will be a new fashion statement. 
BRENT CATCHPOLE 
: Yes there will be a new fashion statement: “My mates are going to buy me a sherry down at the club.” The research that we have done on these ready-to-drink drinks will show that this bill is really just a tax-gathering exercise. Helen Duncan screamed across the House a few moments ago that parents around the country would be pleased with this bill. I tell Helen Duncan that the only ones who will pay for the high-alcohol content are the parents. They will not be pleased by her statements that they will be pleased because it will reduce their children’s drinking. It will not. They will continue to drink these alcopops and ready-to-drink drinks because those are their favoured drinks. They can drink them without any problems and it will be a lot cheaper for them. They will go down to the pub or the off-licence and buy a 6-pack of Vodka Cruisers Vodka KGBs or Vodka Teasers. 
The prices on Baileys sherries and port will skyrocket. These are drinks not of the young people but of the middle-aged and the seniors in our society. Those are the people the Government has targeted. This Government is targeting the seniors the workers and the people who cannot afford to drink the high-alcohol drinks any more. The people on a budget scheme will dread this bill. They will go to their budget advisors and say: “We can no longer afford to pay for the children’s food. We’ve spent it on the higher taxes on alcohol.” That will not slow these people down from buying their higher-alcohol drinks. They will trim it back from the children buying the children’s clothes buying the children food or even allowing their children to go on school trips. They will continue to buy their high-alcohol drinks. It will not slow the drinking of younger people. The younger people will drink and they will get their drinks either from their parents’ drinks cabinet or they will buy the cheaper alcohol with the lower-alcohol volume content. They will not worry about the price. They will continue to drink.