Lame-bic decision

Further to yesterday’s post regarding the imbecility factor of Victoria’s ‘One Slap Fits All’ liquor licensing policy comes this next one.

I received an e-mail last week which reminded me of a new tax law amendment that came into effect last year. I didn’t write about it then because I really didn’t think it was ‘real’, that is to say that I assumed it was a glitch in the system and one whose folly would soon be spotted and the law changed.

But, alas, no.

First, some background. You’ve probably heard of ‘alcopops’? Cheap and cheerful fizzy alcoholic mixed beverages that are so full of sickly sweet sugary goodness that only an unsophisticated palate would find them enticing. Like, for example, teenagers and the feeble-minded. And those for whom beer is just oh-so, like, you know, like ... umm ... beery?! Yuckky!

Alcopops have been developed with the simple premise of getting alcohol into the system of the drinker without them experiencing any sort of nasty alcohol taste. It’s just some generic alcohol flavoured spirit like vodka or gin or whatever mixed with sugar and water. Sweeten them up and they’ll swig it down. Too easy.

Some of you have probably heard of Lambic beers, a style popularised in particular by the Belgians fermented, at least in part, by wild yeasts and flavoured with fruits such as sour cherry or raspberry and distinctive in their dry, vinous, cidery and slightly sour aftertaste. A good example of a true limbic is a joy for the beer lover.

But they are certainly not for everyone. Like, for example, those described above.

And yet – here we go again, folks – some people seem to think that there is no difference between the two. Because lambics are brewed with an addition of beet or candy sugar to achieve the right mouthfeel, alcohol content and, let’s be honest here, so that they conform to accepted brewing standards to be true-to-style they are classified under the same heading as RTD’s.

These RTD’s (Ready To Drink – See? They even have to dumb down the category description) have been identified as one of the main culprits when it comes to underage and binge drinking as well as anti-social behaviour such as bashings, assaults and other assorted incarnations of late night violence.

But Lambics? Seriously. Made for sipping and quiet contemplation, they could never be mistaken for an RTD. Leif Ryan, founder of Phoenix beers and importer of many of my personal favourites like Weihenstephan is running a petition that will hopefully allow the government to see sense on this issue. That’s despite the fact that this tax definition anomaly has already been brought to their attention. And they’ve ignored the pleas of common sense.

More of the story is here.

Cheers
Prof Pilsner

IT’S ALONG WAY TO THE PUB...

It was very pleasing to see the massive show of People Power in Melbourne this week as an estimated ten thousand turned out for a lively but peaceful protest against the State’s ‘one-size-fits-all’ liquor law changes.

Led by Australian music icon Paul Kelly the crowd followed a flat-bed truck down Swanston St in a recreation of AC/DC’s classic 1976 film clip for “It’s a long way to the Top”. The protest was aimed at shining a light on the short-sighted answer to the problems caused by pissed idiots in a few of Melbourne’s large, soulless booze barns run by greedy operators intent on spiling everything for the rest of us.

When live music venue The Tote made the decision to close its doors a few months back as a result of increased license fees it made plenty of people realise that the enjoyment of many was being threatened by the disrespect of a few and I guess that’s why I saw Tuesday’s protest as a massive blow for people power and made me think that there might actually be a groundswell of public feeling out there that ‘we’re not gonna take it’!

Increased license fees and forcing live music venues to employ security is just adding unnecessary expense to many responsible operators while ignoring the fact that there a no more than a handful of cowboys in the industry creating legions of drunk idiots every night of the week. And they can absorb the extra charges as they will just cram another hundred or so in to cover it.

Get rid of the cowboys and discourage the pissed idiots and we’ll go a long way to solving the problems of lawlessness and disorder in our city. A city that, as ACCA DACCA shows in the clip, was once young and innocent and welcoming and cars were allowed to drive down Swanston Street and listening to a band and having a few beers with your mates didn’t mean you’d end up dead in a gutter.

Cheers
Prof. Pilsner

Another one bites the dust

The latest ‘victim’ in this town’s misdirected attempt to combat anti-social behaviour is an iconic Melbourne pub out Collingwood way, The Tote. Once just one of hundreds of venues around the city and suburbs providing a platform for aspiring musos and bands, in recent times The Tote has stood almost alone in its support of emerging talent.

It is being forced out of business because it serves alcohol. Shock. Horror. Think of the children.

The legislators in this town think that, because a massive soul-less concrete bunker that can accommodate five thousand party people at a time can’t seem to control the few mindless idiots who can’t handle their drink (and their drugs) that every single other venue that also serves alcohol should pay the price, too.

We need more police to clean up the mess created by a few. We need money to train and pay them. We will use the venue licence fee to do this. The licence fee is not enough to do this. We will make the licence fee higher and higher until the totals match. Problem solved.

Such a simplistic view would be laughable if it weren’t so real. Changes to the Liquor Licensing laws meant that even the smallest, safest venues with a late liquor license had to do things like;

• Install CCTV equipment
• Hire a minimum of 2 security 30 minutes before and until 30 minutes after live entertainment
• Cop an increase in License Fee of up to 500%

For a venue like The Tote which provided a free night each week to give up-and-coming bands a chance, an increase in running costs is pretty difficult to absorb. You can’t just hope that your patronage magically quadruples and those patrons also pay double for all their drinks – you just have to cop it, or close down. Sadly for the Tote, the latter was the only sound business decision.

I don’t get out to pubs to see bands as much as I did when I was young and untethered but I remember the feel and the vibe and the sense of community that watching a future rock band get their start and in later years saying ‘I knew them before they were big!’ every town needs these places so that we have something other than a TAB/SportsBar/soul-less booze cavern to spend some time and money in.

Hopefully common sense will prevail before the powers-that-be wake up and realise that the solution is in the hands of the venue operators. Don’t let the dickheads in and, if they do sneak in with the humans, cut them off before they cause trouble. But don’t force the good operators to pay for the greed of the others.

Cheers,
Prof. Pilsner

Probably just a coincidence

Radio news in Melbourne this morning led with the story of the Victorian State Premier going on a ride-along with Police patrols in the wee small hours of the morning on Saturday night to view the alcohol related trouble caused by binge drinking.

The purpose of the trip was not, as you might expect, to show support for the ever decreasing and increasingly stressed police force, but to gather evidence before making a decision on the 2am ‘lockout’ legislation. As I have discussed in these pages recently, this lockout, which was designed to stop anti-social booze-fuelled mayhem, was so cock-eyed and poorly planned that not only did it not work, but even had it done so, nearly every ‘at risk’ business which applied for an exemption, got one.

So no one, except maybe the Premier himself, could really understand what he expected to see and how this would alter his thinking. “Hmmm, let’s see. I am looking at how a law that doesn’t do anything, implemented and enforced by no one and punishable by nothing, is working – even though you don’t have to abide by it – and I will observe any changes in the behaviour of pissed idiots as a result of changing nothing in order to determine if I will continue the plan into the future.”

The news reported that Mr Brumby went on a ‘fact finding tour in the early hours ... to determine the future of 2am lockouts” ... (he) “looked on as drunks were arrested, and he revealed serious concerns ... about the price society was paying for policing the intoxicated”. Ahhh!! Now there is a funny little thing! POLICING THE INTOXICATED!! Maybe instead of nanny-ing the many, the Government might think about ENFORCING THE LAW on the few who transgress!!??

But this would be the same mob who recently oversaw the down sizing of the force and its capacity to remove trouble makers from the streets as evidenced by the figures which show that 11 pissed idiots were arrested a couple of weekends ago, and 10 the weekend before. Compare that with 80 pissed idiots that were arrested and removed from the public domain on an average weekend last year!! Add to this that there are now two stations taking in these pissed idiots and around five that are not doing it anymore. Hmmm? Influencing your thinking, Premier?

And on to the newspaper. Let’s see, page three – no boobies, sorry, but a report which headlines; “POLICE QUIT AS MORALE SINKS” It seems that nearly 450 police members have quit or retired in the past 18 months as a result of dissatisfaction with the force. Of these men and women, 299 had been in the job for more than 10 years and 146 had more than 30 years behind the bell. That’s a lot of experience lost through members who are not even near the end of their foreseeable career length. A recent survey saw 3459 members respond and showed that two in three officers had considered quitting in the past year, citing lack of resources, stress and low force morale.

Mr Brumby might rethink his bullshit plan to control the evil grog, or he might just consider giving the streets back to the people who have traditionally provided the deterrent, the defusing and the solution to most of the social issues revolving around drinking irresponsibly.

The Premier goes for a ride to see what anybody could have told him was there while the very people who can solve the problem are being asked to sit back while he develops a plan that they will be asked to control and which will see them stretched to do – even if the plan WOULD work!

As I said, it’s probably just a coincidence.

Oh, just to clarify an error in last weeks bit on the alcopop tax - the figure the Federal Govt is sitting on is not 3 million, but 3 HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS -MOO Ha Ha!!!

Cheers,
Prof. Pilsner

Nothing good happens after 2am

Plenty of chat and opinion and letters to the editors at the moment as Melbourne adjusts to the State Governments latest attempt to flex its’ muscles and frighten the horses without actually having to tackle the problems of alcohol abuse.

Yes, there are problems caused by people who go out to city nightspots, get rollicking drunk, get kicked out, move on to another place, repeat same, get kicked out again and end up kicking a parked car, assaulting a fellow patron, taxi driver or by-stander and, yes the problem seems to have got worse in recent years. But the question is; how do we tackle it?

Our Nanny State came up with a foolproof plan. That is, it’s proof we are governed by fools when it comes to regulating our lives for us instead of making us each responsible for our own actions.

They imposed a strict 2am lockout policy. Once you are in a venue and the little hand is on the 2 and the big hand is on the 12, you can’t get into any other venue serving alcohol if you leave the one you are in. We take away the ability for normal people to have a choice. In this way we solve the problem of pissed idiots roaming the street looking for trouble. Hmmm. You reckon?

Problem One: Pissed idiots don’t work to the clock. They are pissed. And idiots!
Problem Two: The issue is not the time of night; it’s the fact that they are SO pissed. And idiots.
Problem Three: There are not that many pissed idiots compared to the numbers of people enjoying a night out and not being pissed idiots. Why impose blanket bans?
Problem Four: The definition of STRICT seems to have eluded the law makers because nearly every establishment that applied for an exemption – and there were PLENTY – all received one!

So not only do we incorrectly identify the problem, but we then propose a solution that will not achieve any real outcomes, and then, as if to underline the point, we say you don’t have to follow it anyway! Read that last sentence again, it sounds even more ridiculous the second time!!

The problem is, and always has been, this; pissed idiots cause the problems, not the beer. It is the bar staff who are expected to serve responsibly but, if you are too pissed to even get yourself to the bar you can still have your pissed idiot mates get them for you. This makes it difficult for even the best staff to watch every corner of a dimly lit and music filled venue while still serving others. Maybe if security staff could be deployed into the venue to identify them – and let’s face it, that’s not too difficult – we could slow them down, root them out and address the real problem.

Maybe we could help in our own small way. Instead of partying down into the wee small hours, we could be prepared. Before you leave the house for the night, make sure you have a couple of nice craft beers or a selection of imported specialties chilled and ready. Have a night out, leave when the pissed idiots start turning into pumpkins and hit the road, knowing that a quality beery treat awaits at home! Maybe I’m just getting old, but I also just don’t have the same tolerance for pissed idiots as I did in my youth. Plus, today’s’ brand of aggressive and violent dickhead just doesn’t have the same level of humorous charm that the dickhead of old had. If a bloke pops a dollar into a parking space and then sits down in the spot – FUNNY. If he then refuses to move because he still has half an hour left, VERY FUNNY. If a bloke walks up to an unsuspecting stranger and smashes his head in from behind – NOT FUNNY.

Deal with the dickheads. Get them early and get them hard. Make them aware that a civilised society has certain standards that separate us from the cavemen and the raving lunatics. Let them know that they are in a very small minority. Punish those who, after several attempts, still don’t appear to be willing to get with the program. Give bars and clubs the chance to earn a dollar but punish only those who keep misbehaving like the pissed idiots. Don’t line up every normal socialiser hoping for a good night out and every good, well run business and then threaten to smack them all really hard with a wet lettuce because a few people they don’t know are dickheads when they get a skin full.

And if you are only pretending to hold a wet lettuce, who really IS the dickhead?

So, stock the fridge at home with some nice beers, have a great night and remember what every AFL and NRL football player is told by their club – nothing good happens after 2am.

Cheers,
Prof. Pilsner