PJT Accountants
Liquor Act Reforms
17 March 10
Common sense is a bit hard to find these days, and the current Liquor Act Reform proves this. Whilst industry can understand some of the changes, it goes too far. This can be seen by:
- Additional licence fees if no Provision/Availability of meals 2 hours prior to closing. We understand that the government will allow a pie or sausage roll as a meal.
- Approved Managers with a licence are required to be within a 1 hour radius of the hotel. Therefore if you are a Mum and Dad hotel business and live at Cooroy or outskirts of Toowoomba and have no other Approved Managers, you can't go to Brisbane to shop without letting the government know.
- A register is meant to be signed within 1 hour of opening the premises by the Approved Manager. What happens when an Approved Manager works all night and closes the hotel at 5am? After closing and cleaning, he/she has to get up a couple of hours later to sign register and then go back to bed before starting again later that day.
- Hoteliers have to deal with Clubs being allowed to serve alcohol earlier than they can open. An example of this is in areas where shift workers are the main community i.e. mining towns. The clubs actually received an allowance to open earlier to allow these shift workers a beer after they finished work; however the hotels are not allowed.
Hopefully common sense will prevail; but unfortunately you can't buy common sense.
