As Dunedin prepares for another Orientation week, the usual tut-tutting will no doubt follow the inevitable drunken escapades of some students. Debbie Porteous looks at the issue of the responsibility of other players.
Orientation week begins on Monday, and as off-licence proprietors and supermarket managers deny various under-$1-a-bottle beer specials this week have anything to do with Orientation, the author of a 10-year study of the drinking behaviour of New Zealand tertiary students says that even the mere perception of such specials encourages people to drink more.
Dr Kyp Kypri, formerly a University of Otago researcher and now a senior medical research fellow at the school of medicine and public health at the University of Newcastle in Australia, said the research confirmed what had been previously suspected, that the more liquor outlets there were near student flats and the more promotions there were, the more likely students were to drink heavily and experience alcohol-related problems.
Yes, he said, the individual, their social circle and the institution they attended should shoulder some responsibility for the drinking behaviour of students, but environmental factors also contributed significantly to how students drank.
In fact, Dr Kypri said the promotion and advertising of alcohol was largely unregulation and this was probably the biggest issue New Zealand faced in addressing heavy drinking, Dr Kypri said.
He noted that as a regular traveller between New Zealand and other countries, New Zealand had by far the most billboards and point-of-sale alcohol advertising.
Educating individuals about alcohol use did not work in an environment where everything around them was working towards something harmful, he said.
There was scope for the Government and local authorities to do more to control liquor outlet density and the promotion of alcohol, and he acknowledged those issues were being looked at as part of a review of the liquor control in New Zealand.
It appeared the general public was also becoming less tolerant of alcohol promotion.
A story that appeared in the Otago Daily Times in 2000 about free bottled vodka drinks being handed out to students to promote a radio station during orientation week probably would not be written in such a jovial tone now, he said.
"I suspect that there's just beginning to be a consciousness about the risks of promoting alcohol."
There had been real progress in recent years on the part of the University of Otago, which now accepted some moral duty of care towards its students.
It was good to see the university objecting more to liquor licence renewals in the campus area, and the Campus Watch initiative was having positive effects.
Student associations had also shifted the focus of their events away from alcohol in the past few years.
"It is great to see them becoming proactive."
As the various authorities and industries wait for the first case to test the Liquor Licensing Authority's (LLA) promise to question the suitability of off-licensees who practised loss-leading, the excuses of off-licensees begin to wear thin, Dr Kypri says.
"Let's not make any pretence about what this industry's about. Their attitude is: if its success severely harms the public health, so what? I'm getting pretty jaded with that, actually."
With the evidence mounting that cheap, easily-accessible liquor can contribute to liquor abuse, significant hints in recent LLA decisions indicate the authority is also looking to take a tougher stance with off-licensees.
In a December decision, LLA chairman Judge Bill Unwin warned loss-leading - the practice of advertising and selling goods at less than cost to attract more customers to the store and sell more products - could in the future bring an applicant's suitability to hold a licence into question.
The comment was made in a decision about an application for a new off-licence premises in Halswell, near Christchurch, in which the applicant conceded he practised loss-leading in a New World franchise he also owned.
"If a licensee issues liquor to loss-lead, then he or she is stimulating and not meeting demand. Where liquor is involved, it is not good enough to say [as they do] that they have to continue with this business practice because of competition.
In our experience, loss leading helps to promote the abuse of liquor.
"In the future, examples of loss-leading by an off-licence will be treated as an indication of a lack of suitability."
The evidence was clear that longer trading hours for some off-licensed premises (particularly those that loss-lead and/or targeted young purchasers) would encourage liquor abuse, the LLA said.
Judge Unwin noted the LLA had little discretion to judge whether an applicant was suitable to hold a licence to sell liquor, but "given current research we wonder whether there might not be cases where the clear and likely potential to increase liquor abuse, can impact the way we tailor the conditions of the licence to meet each factual situation".
He granted the off-licence, but limited trading to between 11am and 8pm, not 11pm as applied for.
In a decision issued two weeks later, he limited the 24-hour licence of the Papakura Countdown to between 7am and 11pm based on the town's mayor's complaint about the "increased issues of antisocial behaviour" resulting from late-night liquor availability.
Since the 24-hour licence was granted, the council had been forced to impose a bylaw banning the consumption of liquor in public places, a liquor ban had been placed on the supermarket's car park and people had come to negatively view the town centre.
After being approached by the police and the council, the licensee had agreed to close at midnight and since then reported that cases of antisocial behaviour, car crashes and general disorder in the town centre had reduced, the mayor told the LLA.
This was the first time the LLA had heard, in a formal presentation, the impact that 24-hour licensing of supermarkets could have on a community, Judge Unwin said.
"As a major supplier of liquor to the community, we think it is time for the company to accept some responsibility for the negative consequences of its successful marketing strategies."
He renewed the off-licence, but restricted trading to between 7am and 11pm daily.
Back in Dunedin, the District Licensing Agency and the police say they are powerless to do anything about the beer deals now on offer.
While on-licensees are bound by legislation that makes it illegal to run a promotion that encourages excess drinking, there is no law controlling alcohol promotions run by off-licensees, such as supermarkets or bottle stores.
It is one of the many issues being considered as part of the Law Commission's all-encompassing, comprehensive review of the control and sale of alcohol in New Zealand.
The present laws are expected to remain as they are at least until the review is completed in two years' time.
Supermarket chains contacted yesterday said as long as their competitors dropped their prices, loss-leading on alcohol would continue in the meantime, but would be rare.
While beer in one bottlestore was on sale for $8.99 per dozen 330ml bottles yesterday, Foodstuffs South Island chief executive Steve Anderson denied loss-leading at Foodstuffs' New World and Pak N' Save stores targeted specific events, such as Orientation.
Specials were generally South Island-wide, he said. Sometimes selling beer for under $1 a can was not loss-leading.
For example, deals such as the $20 for a 24-pack available during last year's Undie 500 weekend were the result of a cheap deal with that beer's supplier.
He could not specifically recall Judge Unwin's comments, and did not know what to expect when applications to renew the off-licences of stores that had loss-led were heard in the future.
He was happy the law commission would address any of the present concerns the public had, and Foodstuffs was feeding into that process.
Both Mr Anderson and a spokesman from Progressive Enterprises, which owns Countdown, Woolworths and Fresh Choice stores, said loss-leading was a reaction to another store's cheap pricing and did not happen very often because there was no money to be made from it.
Asked how it could justify loss-leading in the light of Judge Unwin's comments, the Progressive spokesman said in a statement the company aimed to "balance our role of providing customers with a competitive offer in all categories with our responsibility to uphold all laws governing the responsible sale of beer and wine".
It recognised the seriousness of excessive consumption on communities, and harm minimisation was a key component of the company's strategy for selling beer and wine.
The spokesman did not elaborate, but said staff were trained to ask everyone who looked under 25 for ID before selling them beer or wine.
