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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 8 Hansard (27 June) . . Page.. 2553 ..

Liquor trading hours

The Committee recommended that the current 24 hours liquor trading regime be retained.

While the Liquor Act 1975 provides for 24 hour trading the Legislative Assembly passed legislation in March which gives to the Attorney-General power to curtail liquor trading hours. This legislation contains a 12 month sunset clause, and the intention is to trial restricted trading during that 12 month period in an attempt to measure the effect of trading hours on public safety. Evaluation of the trial will be undertaken by independent consultants experienced in criminological research. As a first step in the evaluation process, a review of the literature on research conducted elsewhere is currently underway.

I have made it clear on several occasions that the Government would review the hours for liquor trading after analysing the effect of the summer enforcement strategy for late night entertainment areas, to see how well that has worked and whether licensees themselves adhered to responsible serving of alcohol practices.

I have also had extensive consultation with industry representatives.

Assuming that the review of the literature referred to earlier confirms that we should proceed with a trial of restricted liquor trading hours, the Government plans to restrict the sale of liquor to the hours of 7.00 am to 4.00 am the following day. That is, liquor will not be able to be sold during the hours between 4.00 am and 7.00 am. This restriction will apply to liquor licenses, (excluding the Canberra Casino and hotel mini-bars), from a date to be fixed in August 1996, until a date to be fixed in March 1997.

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