Clark David: Alcohol Reform Bill — Procedure In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Clark David: Alcohol Reform Bill — Procedure In Committee 
[Sitting date: 23 October 2012. Volume:685;Page:6094. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North) 
: 
 I rise to respond mainly to a couple of comments made by the Minister in the chair the Associate Minister of Justice which I want to debate a little. He challenged a view that he suggested I was taking that the German cultural system be overlaid in the New Zealand situation in respect of our understanding of alcohol. 
I just want to be clear in my intention in speaking of the German situation in respect of alcohol. They have a drinking age that is much younger and a culture that reflects an understanding of alcohol as a social lubricant in a similar way to us but with an understanding that those who experiment are much younger and therefore experimentation with alcohol is considered a more juvenile thing whereas in New Zealand it is often associated with adulthood which has its own complications. In raising that whole issue I was really wanting to say that there are other ways of having a culture around alcohol. 
I was not wishing to suggest that we should adopt wholeheartedly the German situation nor that ours in its own way is completely faulty either. What I was wishing to suggest was that there are other ways of conceptualising alcohol culture and that we have in this legislation the Alcohol Reform Bill an opportunity to actually make a measurable difference in our own society and in the culture around alcohol through pulling the levers that are at our disposal as recommended by the Law Commission in its report. Those levers that are most effective according to the Law Commission report are the levers around price and marketing. Those are precisely the levers that this Government is refusing to go near. 
My Supplementary Order Paper 115 aims to address the issue of marketing. It deliberately sets out—modelled on the tobacco legislation—to ensure that new advertising is not created to entice people to drink alcohol who would not otherwise be drinking alcohol recognising that there are harms associated with alcohol. When the research is looked at that is pretty evident to anybody who looks at it with a dispassionate eye. It is not something that needs to be encouraged. It is part of our culture and not all aspects of alcohol are bad for our culture in my view. 
I want to suggest that we could however make a measurable difference as suggested by the science through adopting some of the more sensible Supplementary Order Papers that have been put forward. There are three that have been put forward in this area: my one Supplementary Order Paper 81 by Te Ururoa Flavell and Supplementary Order Paper 91 by Iain Lees-Galloway. These three make some steps in that area. They would make a measurable difference to the culture of alcohol in New Zealand over time when alcohol ceases to be glamorised in the way that it is currently. That is worth doing. I do not see how the Minister could argue otherwise. 
The other point that the Minister in the chair made as I understand it was that the Law Commission had recommended in one of its reports that voting in respect of alcohol issues be along party lines. That might very well be true if the legislation that was put before the House was in line with what the Law Commission was recommending. I contend that the law that has been proposed to the House to adopt is not along the lines of what the Law Commission was recommending in all aspects. 
Some aspects—and I concede that there are some useful aspects and that is why I will be supporting the legislation—address issues of distribution which are usefully addressed and do make a difference according to the evidence. But other major changes that could be made to effect positive change in our alcohol culture are not being considered. Instead we are being railroaded primarily into a debate on age which in my view is largely a sideshow. Changing the age does make a difference. The evidence suggests that changing the age is like starting to bail out a bucket with a teaspoon but that is still a change and over time it does make a difference. 
There is plenty of evidence to suggest that pulling these bigger levers does make a difference. The distribution lever which the Government is pulling will make a difference. Our local councils support the particular change that is proposed because they have examples where that particular lever has not been available to them and they would have liked it to be. It could have made positive change in our community in Dunedin.