A report back on alcohol to the Otara Community

Otara Music and Arts Centre Otara, Manukau City

5 May 2010

Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey Palmer SC

President Law Commission

Introduction

One of the many challenges the people of Otara delivered the Law Commission at our meeting last August, was to come back.

You said to us: “it’s all very fine to come and consult with us, but then you people go back to Wellington and we never hear from you again.”

Well, today we are back. And we are grateful for the opportunity to talk with you again.

We are here to report to you on our review of New Zealand’s alcohol laws. A review which has taken nearly two years and has involved 14 government departments: a review which has taken us from the far north to the deep south as we attempted to come to grips with the problems associated with New Zealand’s drinking culture and to assess the adequacy of the current law as a tool for curbing the harms associated with that culture.

With ALAC’s invaluable assistance, we were able to engage with a very diverse range of people and communities.

Our meeting in this hall last August drew over 100 concerned citizens and had a profound impact on the Commission staff who attended.

In the months following, I frequently quoted some of the stories and pleas that were voiced during that meeting.

Comments such as “Alcohol is destroying our community”

“We need to get it out of our faces”

“People are crying out for action, now!”

A number of things stand out in my mind from that first meeting:

_ your passion for, and commitment to, your community;

_ your conviction that saturating your community with alcohol was having a profoundly negative effect on your young people and your families; and

3 _ your anger and frustration at being unable to influence how alcohol is sold and promoted on your own backdoor step.

As you will read in Chapter 1 of our report, similar sentiments were expressed by communities all around the country, from rural Canterbury to Porirua, to Whangarei.

But there were few places that matched the sense of urgency that the people of Otara managed to communicate to us in the few hours we spent with you last year. You also sent us away with a very clear sense of your priorities around alcohol.

These were:

_ the need for your voices to be heard in decisions about how alcohol is sold;

_ a desire to see alcohol advertising, sponsorship and promotion banned;

_ the need to tackle the availability of alcohol and in particular the issues arising from the proliferation of liquor outlets in your community; and

_ the need to strengthen and support the role of parents as first teachers and role models around alcohol use.

Each of these issues is considered in some depth in our final report.

Read the full text of this speech here.

ENDS

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