It looks like 2016 kicked off with a focus on alcohol, and the reduction of how, when, where and how much is available. The follow are some articles of interest, and commentary relating to alcohol and events from the last week or so.
How far are we from what is happening in Sydney? This is a long article but well researched and written. It’s worth the time to read it all, so you are informed and ready for what could possibly happen in New Zealand in the future.
Sydney’s fun police have put out the light of the nightlife. The city’s a global laughing stock
“There’s a whole Orwellian nomenclature that has been made up to deliberately keep the general public in a constant state of confusion that some terror has swept across the city: “king hit”, “coward punch”, “alcopop”, “alcohol-related violence”. Being quite a respectable lot, we’ve all been guilt shamed into thinking that something in the Australian psyche is ugly and that mixed with alcohol we turn into raging brutes, or that by simply having fun somehow we’ve been breaking some great moral code, the 11th commandment: thou shalt not have fun.
But that’s all a load of rubbish and in actual fact, you’ve done nothing wrong at all. In fact you’ve been very well behaved. Sydney ranks more safe than Bordeaux, France, or Lausanne, Switzerland, for crime.”
NSW Police Questions 10 William Street Over a Wine List
“So according to NSW POLICE FORCE our blackboard with what we are pouring by the glass is promoting unsavoury behaviour. SYDNEY WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING.”
Wellington Sevens
“But at its peak, it brought in $15 million in economic benefits to Wellington.“
“Hospitality NZ Wellington president Jeremy Smith said hotel bookings were strong over the sevens weekend, but spending at the city’s bars was not as great as hoped.”
6 arrests (both days)
58 evicted (day one)
35 treated by Wellington Free Ambulance (day one)
(note crowd was only 42% of previous years sellouts 14,000 Saturday, 15,500 Sunday)
Past statistics for the Wellington Sevens (towards the bottom of the page)
Sevens fans turned away after breath-test
“Our staff conduct an assessment on every patron coming into the venue on under the new Sale and Supply of Liquor Act. It defines intoxication. It lists a number of factors,” Mr Harmon told NZME.
These include slurring and dishevelment and any two of those could see someone turned away.
Breath tests were not used as part of that assessment.
“It was only provided as an option to the patron if they dispute our assessment,” he said.
“It’s only used for resolving disputes. We actually don’t use it to assess intoxication, we look for visible signs of intoxication.
“There’s no specific limit, it’s simply a tool for us to show the patron that our assessment is correct.”
HOW LONG BEFORE THIS IS A TOOL TO ENTER ALL EVENTS? IS THAT SUCH A BAD THING?
WHAT IS THE LEGAL DEFINITION OF DRUNK IN NEW ZEALAND? Is it the same as the BAC of 0.05 for driving a car? Is it the same as defined in the USA of BAC 0.08?
Auckland Nines
NRL Auckland Nines to follow Wellington Sevens in breath testing fans
“First the Wellington Sevens, now the NRL Auckland Nines. The PC brigade will strike another major sporting event with the Nines set to breath-test punters upon entry.
Those too drunk will be barred from the two-day event, which hosts 16 NRL teams in 31 games on Saturday and Sunday, at Eden Park.”
ODI NZ vs Australia Eden Park
I went to the first ODI between NZ and Australia at Eden Park. The weather was perfect, game was exciting and company was great. I hadn’t been to watch the cricket for a number of years. Not since you could take a chilly bin with your own food and drinks in it.
OK straight to the point. The food and beverage selection on offer was extremely underwhelming. Plastic cups, I can understand and live with that. The beer though was industrial megaswill, or near beer. Why not have some offering of craft beer or beer with flavour, something worth tasting? I’d guess that easily 10% of the people there would have been craft beer drinkers.
Eden Park could increase attendance by lifting their food and beverage offerings. It’s a turn off to go to the cricket for 8 hours and have to put up with such a poor offerings. How hard would it be to sell some of the stands around the stadium to craft brewers and food truck operators. It would be amazing, how much better of a time would you have?
You pay to see world-class sporting events and get offered the cheapest food and beverages. Such a shame.
Then there was this article below, I didn’t notice on the day. Then again I drank very little beer. (one observation I did notice was the number of guys that had chosen to drink wine. Guessing a large number it was for the alcohol content, but there must have been some that drank it for the flavour. I know I was seriously contemplating the wine).
Sideswipe: Feb 05: Two cups, one fan
“Funny thing happened at the cricket on Wednesday,” writes Dave. “Halfway through the match the limit of beers you could buy at one time went from four down to two – normal procedure to stop people getting too rowdy as the game goes on. But this time as well as reducing the limit they also switched out the cups to a significantly smaller size [pictured]. You could say this is also a safety measure but not when they keep charging the same price of $8.50. Nice of them to try to keep people safe, but not so sure they should be ramping up their margins because they think people will be too drunk to notice!”
Above are observation of what is currently happening. You need to ask questions about how far things should go to limit and control the public at events, and the responsible control of alcohol at events, and in bars. Food is an important part of drinking alcohol, beyond the joy and pleasure of consuming it. Better offerings are likely to be more inviting for people to want to consume them, Eden Park. Then again I didn’t see any trouble or people who were showing obvious signs of being intoxicated.
New Zealand Beer Festival has just announced they are back for 2016. Lets hope things are more user friendly for the 2016 event. NZ Beer Festival 2014 Review
This is a little random. Or is it…?
Some links relating to this:
https://www.aclu.org/blog/free-future/chinas-nightmarish-citizen-scores-are-warning-americans
https://www.techinasia.com/china-citizen-scores-credit-system-orwellian
http://english.caixin.com/2015-09-28/100859064.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-34592186
If you made it this far, well done.