Hague Kevin: Alcohol Reform Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Hague Kevin: Alcohol Reform Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 24 October 2012. Volume:685;Page:6140. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
KEVIN HAGUE (Green) 
: 
 Could I express my gratitude and that of my party to the Government and to other parties in the House for the change to the rules of engagement for this part to enable us to take an adequate number of calls. 
I have spoken several times in the Chamber about the Ottawa Charter in this debate and in particular about the sense in the Ottawa Charter to which New Zealand is a signatory that to improve the health of a community we need to empower that community—I will deal with that part of the charter in another call—but also to create a supportive environment around that community. The evidence that the Law Commission heard and that members of this Committee are I think all too familiar with is that the environment that some of our most marginalised and vulnerable communities are surrounded by is such that they are practically being basted in alcohol. It is impossible for them to escape the ubiquity of alcohol outlets and sales if they choose to. 
Essentially in recent years we have come to a situation where alcohol is available for sale in pretty much every community in the country essentially 24/7—24 hours a day 7 days a week. Indeed there are around 1000 outlets in New Zealand that are licensed to sell alcohol on a 24/7 basis. Indeed in the years between 1990 and 2010 in that 20-year period there has been an addition—an explosion—of 8000 new outlets selling alcohol. Certainly members will be aware of many alcohol outlets in our own communities. These new outlets are not randomly distributed throughout the country or throughout communities or population centres but rather are clustered in low socio-economic status areas. They are clustered in the areas inhabited by the most vulnerable and marginalised. The distance that a person would need to travel in a low socio-economic status area on average to make it to an alcohol outlet is 50 percent less than the equivalent high socio-economic status suburb or area. It is just an indication of how the alcohol industry at its various levels has targeted these low socio-economic status communities. 
The effects of this are considerable. The evidence is and I quote from the Drug Foundation again that “For every off-licence within a kilometre of a residential area there is a 4 percent increase in binge drinking. Outlet density is linked to underage drinking student drinking and high-risk drinking by young people.” The weight of evidence is that when the density of alcohol outlets increases we also see increased rates of violence and physical assaults sexually transmitted infections child abuse drink-driving and those other deleterious consequences of alcohol consumption or heavy alcohol consumption that this bill the Alcohol Reform Bill sets out to minimise. So there is a direct relationship between outlet density and the purpose of this bill which is to minimise harm. 
I mentioned yesterday that 70 percent of our presentations to accident and emergency departments over weekends are from people who have been consuming alcohol and I talked about those 1000 deaths per year. Those are some of those negative consequences associated with the outlet density. There are also aspects of availability that relate to the hours that these outlets are open. Indeed there is strong evidence showing that longer trading hours mean increased negative and harmful effects. I will not go through that list again but it is clear that both outlet density and increased outlet hours are associated with increased harm. So if we want to deal with that harm—and this bill says that we do want to deal with it—then we need to address both of those factors. 
In the way that the bill sets out to do that I think there are some advances but those advances as with every other part of the bill do not go far enough. Again the Green Party will be voting for all of the Supplementary Order Papers that have been put forward by Opposition members and by the Maori Party to actually gain greater control over where outlets are and the hours that they can be open in order to minimise that harm. The evidence around support for those measures is strong. As usual the scientific research around those factors says that these are very effective means of limiting harm and the Law Commission indeed drew some conclusions that were stronger than those in the bill itself. 
But it is not only the Law Commission. The New Zealand public has also had its say through the Health Sponsorship Council survey in 2010 which showed that 66 percent agreed or strongly agreed with reducing the hours that alcohol can be sold. In addition to that 66 percent there were a further 18 percent who were neutral about that point. That is a vast majority who are either supportive of our tackling that issue or are neutral about it. There were 65 percent of New Zealanders who thought there were too many liquor outlets. I am going to come in a later call to the issue of local alcohol policies but for the time being what I want to emphasise is the importance of taking this measure. 
Again just as with the calls we heard earlier in this Committee stage we are dealing here with an issue that there is strong evidence around and I will be very interested to hear the Minister of Justice’s calls and other calls taken by Government members to defend the course that is set out in the bill which I consider to be inadequate. This is in contrast to the raging debate that we had around purchase age only a short time ago where there is very little evidence indeed of effectiveness. Here is something that has strong evidence of effectiveness that is recommended by the Law Commission and that enjoys a very high level of support from the New Zealand public. We believe that the bill sets out in the right direction but does not go nearly far enough. We want to see much more control over where outlets can be. Louisa Wall’s amendments around schools for example are a good example of the kind of restriction that we would like to see in general applied right across the country in addition to the locally specific controls that local alcohol policies will produce. And we want to see a very substantial restriction of the hours that alcohol can be sold. We heard yesterday from Trevor Mallard in this debate a contribution where he opposed on the basis of his personal experience the idea of restricting the hours of sale of alcohol. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: That’s right—shift workers. Stand up for the shift workers. 
KEVIN HAGUE 
: Indeed. I have been a shift worker myself and have always somehow managed to get a drink.