Chauvel Charles: Alcohol Reform Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Chauvel Charles: Alcohol Reform Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 24 October 2012. Volume:685;Page:6167. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
CHARLES CHAUVEL (Labour) 
: 
 I would like to echo the sentiments of the speaker who has resumed his seat Kevin Hague. After I spoke about the local alcohol policy issue the Minister of Justice got to her feet and explained the Government’s position but I think notwithstanding what was said on that occasion the reality is this: communities that are most at risk from alcohol abuse are going to contain people who are the least equipped and the least motivated to get involved at local government level and to try to make a difference. That is the reality. It is a sad reality but that was the evidence that the Justice and Electoral Committee heard. 
To say we are not going to require local government authorities to act responsibly by considering the issue of the content of what sort of policy should exist in their region submitted on exhaustively by the public and containing rules that are appropriate to that region but that we are simply going to make it optional as to whether they have those rules that will influence their licensing decisions is frankly the height of irresponsibility. And if we are serious about trying to address the harm that alcohol can cause in our communities when it is used irresponsibly we would require the next tier of government down from this House to address the issue. That is all we would be doing. We would not be telling them how to do it. It would be up to them if we were to follow the approach in either Supplementary Order Paper 109 in my name or Supplementary Order Paper 80 in Mr Hague’s name. We would simply be saying: “Here are the criteria that you can address here is the consultative procedure that you should adopt ask your communities what rules you should follow when you make a licensing decision and then follow them.” Probably the worst abdication of responsibility that we could undertake in this debate if we fail to consider those Supplementary Order Papers seriously is that failure. 
I want to address another Supplementary Order Paper that has been spoken to by its sponsor already in the debate and that is Supplementary Order Paper 113 which stands in the name of my dear friend and colleague Lianne Dalziel. She spoke to this paper only some minutes ago and I found it as I always do when I listen to her contributions a compelling speech. She made a couple of points that were very important. They bear repeating given the lies frankly that have circulated about what her Supplementary Order Paper would do. The fact that those lies have circulated indicates the force and the power of the vested interests that stand against sensible regulation in this area. 
What her Supplementary Order Paper would do as we heard Lianne Dalziel tell the Committee is this. It would simply insert a one or two-line clause into the bill that would give the Minister in the chair a particular power. That power would be that when she receives the report that she has already asked officials for—that is a report on the merits of whether there ought to be a minimum alcohol price and whether it would make a difference to binge drinking particularly in respect of the very cheap $6 wine - type products that she mentioned in her contribution—then the Minister would be able to make regulations that bring into effect a minimum pricing regime to address those very low-end products. 
The point about those low-end products is this and I am sure that this will be borne out in the evidence that the Minister receives from her working group. When people pre-load—which is a term we learnt at the select committee; it is in the Law Commission report as well; before people go out to drink they drink at home and get drunk before they go out and get drunker which is the essence of this binge drinking culture that I think we all agree we need to address—one of the beverages of choice for doing that is those very very cheap loss-leading bottles of wine that are able to be purchased at the supermarket. If we were able to raise the price at that very low end of the market through the sort of regime that the Minister would be free to introduce under the powers that Lianne Dalziel’s Supplementary Order Paper would confer on her then we would make a big difference to at least one important aspect of our binge drinking culture. 
That is all that the Supplementary Order Paper does: it just confers a power on the Minister. Who knows? If the Minister is able to overcome the enormous pressure that has clearly been brought to bear on her and others by the industry at the time that the report on minimum pricing is received by her and does determine to introduce such a regime then she is going to have to come back to the House anyway and request that we give her powers to do so. She will have to take powers; they are not already on the statute book. What we are trying to do what Lianne Dalziel is trying to do is simply save her the need to do that. We are the Opposition: we are here to help. What we are doing is simply saying to the Minister that rather than having to go to the Leader of the House and ask for yet more time to take up with the parliamentary agenda on alcohol law reform she could simply have the power now. She would not have to use it. It would never have to be brought into force either if the evidence does not support it which I doubt or if she chooses to bow to the status quo and not bring in the minimum pricing regime. But should she choose to do so then my colleague’s Supplementary Order Paper would empower her to do it. 
There would be the usual checks and balances that surround the exercise of such powers. The Minister would bring in a scheme by regulation. The scheme would be laid on the Table. It would be presented to the Regulations Review Committee and scrutinised. It would be open to complaint so if the industry or anybody else did not like it or if the punters felt that it was putting up the cost of their harmless leisure drinking—drinking with food the occasional tipple—they would be able to complain to the committee and seek to have the scheme set aside. And any member of the Regulations Review Committee as you know could come along to the House with a disallowance motion. So there would be all sorts of safeguards in place. There would be all sorts of scrutiny that would apply to this sort of scheme but there would be enormous freedom for the Minister to use the evidence to come up with the sort of regulatory regime that we heard in the select committee would make a real difference along with the sorts of changes that we have seen proposed in Supplementary Order Papers around advertising and the sorts of Supplementary Order Papers that we have seen around availability. The final leg in that trifecta is pricing. 
All that Lianne Dalziel is trying to do here is empower the Minister to deal with this issue to give her one of the essential tools that we heard the experts tell us is required if this matter of binge drinking is to be finally and properly addressed by this Parliament. If National Party members decide to vote this Supplementary Order Paper down by accepting the whip as we anticipate they will then they will be doing a major disservice to the cause of alcohol law reform in New Zealand. It will be a major lost opportunity. 
I remember that when the Minister was addressing the question of local alcohol policies and whether or not they ought to be required by territorial local authorities she said something like this—and she will forgive me if I am not paraphrasing her exactly—“Members of local authorities will be punished through an electoral reckoning if they fail to live up to their responsibilities.” Well I want to remind the Minister and National Party members of those words now because if National Party members fail in this fundamental duty to keep New Zealanders safe by addressing the issue of price as we were told by the experts that we should on this occasion then there will be an electoral reckoning. Every member on this side of the Chamber who supports Lianne Dalziel’s Supplementary Order Paper and like measures that are before the Committee will be reminding the electorate of that failure. It is our duty to do that. If members do support the objects and purposes of the bill which are to try to bring in better controls to combat the problems we have around the unfortunate aspects of misuse of alcohol in our society then price is a fundamental mechanism. I for the life of me cannot see why a Minister would decline powers that would allow her to act in the event that she receives recommendations from a review that is already on foot and could report at any time soon and that would prevent her from having to come back to the House and seek time on the Order Paper. This is a sensible Supplementary Order Paper—