Scott Lynda: Customs and Excise (Alcoholic Beverages) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Third Reading 
Scott Lynda: Customs and Excise (Alcoholic Beverages) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:608;Page:5372] 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT (NZ National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 What a sanctimonious speech that was if ever I heard one. If this Government was actually planning to do something about alcohol consumption that would be good but it seems to have missed one very important point. Everyone over there on the Government benches has missed one very important point—that is the ready-to-drink alcopops have 5 to 7 percent alcohol by volume in them and are not captured by this bill that is being rushed through the House under extraordinary urgency. We have heard those sanctimonious speeches about doing something about youth drinking but those drinks are not covered. I hope that somebody on the Government side of the House will realise that and get up and give another speech about the fact that young people will not be captured under this measure. It will do nothing about the alcopops that are so easy for young people to drink. All that this bill is is a tax grab. 
This legislation will affect sherries and ports. Exactly how many young people drink sherry and port? I do not think there are very many. The ones that I know do not drink sherry and port. Who does drink sherry and port? Older people do that. They are the ones who will be caught by this tax grab which sees a 100 percent increase in duty on any drink that has from 14 to 23 percent of alcohol by volume in it. Something else will be captured that some of us rather like with desert at night: late-harvest wines. Do young people drink them? 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Mine do! 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT 
: I do not think a lot of them drink such wines either. Young people do not drink sherry port or very expensive late-harvest wines. Only Mr Mallard says that his children drink late-harvest wines. They will be caught by this bill that is being rushed through tonight under extraordinary urgency. We have heard about the kids. Yet the kids who are drinking too much alcohol will not be caught by this legislation. It is just a sham—an absolute sham. This Government has closed Queen Mary Hospital’s youth programme for the kids who have the very worst alcohol and drug addiction problems. It has cut that programme in my electorate; it does not care about youth drinking. 
Brian Connell 
: Who did that? 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT 
: The Labour Government that says it cares so much about youth drinking did that. The mental health report shows that we have a major lack of youth programmes in this country. What has the Government done about that? Nothing. But tonight under extraordinary urgency the Government tries to sell this bill which is simply and utterly an $18 million tax grab wrapped up in political spin that says it wants to do something about youth drinking. 
We all want to do something about youth drinking but this bill will not do that. It totally and utterly misses the mark and is just a sham. Kids are not dumb; they are not stupid. If they are so price sensitive they will just buy the alcohol—the gin and the vodka—and the Fanta and the Coke and mix the drinks themselves. Young people would do that if ready-to-drink drinks were captured by this bill but they are not so they will not have to bother. We can forget about all that. Young people will just not have to bother mixing their drinks themselves. If the Government did want to do something about youth drinking the ready-mixed drinks are what it should have targeted. 
Yes we certainly do need to try to change New Zealand’s culture of binge drinking—absolutely! I would be the first person to agree with that. I have been in accident and emergency departments stitching up the kids who come in from car accidents. I have been on the front line so I know what it is like and I would like to do something about that. But this bill does absolutely nothing. It is all the older people who like a little bit of sherry or port who will be unable to have a drink. It will be an extra cost for them. As they tuck up cold in bed because of the power crisis—a power crisis that will cause blackouts and the Government has done nothing about that—they will wrap up in their blankets and they might like to have a little bit of sherry or port just to warm them up on the inside. But what will happen? They will all have to pay a whole lot more for that. It will be a cold winter for the older people of this country and they will not even be able to have an enjoyable port or sherry because this Government has increased the excise duty not on the things that the kids drink but on the things that older people drink—the sherries the ports and the late-harvest Rieslings. 
Our wine industry will not be very happy about that. I represent the Kaikoura electorate—that is Marlborough and Waipara. Those areas have absolutely fabulous stunning wine and they will not be happy that this Government has doubled the excise duty tonight on wines that happen to just creep over that 14 percent alcohol by volume mark raising the duty from $21 to $39 per litre. Some of those wines are late-harvest Rieslings too. Those areas will not be happy with this Government. We will have to have a serious look at that. 
We heard back then—when was it? Here we are; that is right. It was actually in May 2001 that Dr Cullen introduced the tobacco excise. That is funny—it happens to be May again just before Budget time. Well fancy that! When Dr Cullen said before the election last year—after the tobacco excise duty was increased in May 2001—that it was most unlikely there would be any increase in tobacco or alcohol excise we did not think we would see this measure tonight. But here we are with another broken promise because another tax is being introduced in May. And why are we doing it at the beginning of May I wonder? Maybe it has something to do with the Budget. I think it may just be that Dr Cullen does not want his Budget to be sullied with something that is as unpleasant as this bill that we are debating here under extraordinary urgency tonight. But here we are with this bill being rushed in. 
Now if we were to do something about young people and their drinking why are we debating this bill now? Why did we not have this debate earlier in the day when we could have actually got some really good publicity about what we should do in this country about youth drinking? We could have got that publicity in the papers. It is very very important to try to get free publicity out there in order to try to convince kids that binge drinking is extremely bad for them that we do need to have a much more responsible approach to alcohol and alcohol consumption and that there is nothing great about getting oneself absolutely drunk on a Saturday night—that it is not a great thing to do because it leads to all sorts of negative consequences. We could have publicised that if we had had this debate at a time when we had cameras and some media interest and that would have been really good. But no that did not happen. We were told about the urgency at 9 p.m. tonight and we did not get the bill until 8.30 tonight. 
We are rushing this bill through under extraordinary urgency simply and utterly so that Dr Cullen’s Budget will not be sullied by something as unpleasant as this $18 million tax grab. I would really like to do something about the alcohol consumption of New Zealanders but this bill does not do it. That group on the Government side of the House has not even got it right. The ready-to-drink alcopops have 5 to 7 percent alcohol by volume and they are not covered by this bill.