Relaxing licensing laws: It’s about improving choices
SOME of you may have heard the comments on BBC Guernsey over the weekend from Simon Allan, licensee at The Cornerstone, in relation to the Home Affairs policy letter which intends to adjust the licensing hours for Good Friday and Christmas Day. Mr Allan opposes our proposed changes and gave his reasons as family-related. He says that because Christmas is marketed towards being a family day our regulations should reflect that. I’m not sure how commercial marketing should influence government policy but those were his words. He gave an example that a family member could be expected at the family home on Christmas Day, but instead they could ‘go missing’ with these changes to the law. Now personally I don’t think that relaxing licensing regulations as recommended in the policy letter is going to encourage islanders to stay in the pub all day. The current law already permits the sale of alcohol from off-licences between 7am and midnight on Christmas Day and Good Friday and most licensees will choose not to open for the maximum hours and instead choose hours of opening more suitable to their business and also their personal wishes – no establishment is being forced to open, it’s the individual licensee’s personal choice, just as it is the consumer’s personal choice if they want to go to a licensed premises or not.
I will now give an example of how all islanders, not just those who drink alcohol, can benefit: Good Friday just gone I went with my son to a local hotel for lunch. We arrived at about 1.15pm and the venue (The Rocquettes Hotel) was very busy as usual. Neither of us was drinking – my son only drinks water and I had a coffee. Come around 2.15pm the manager came to our table and advised us that because of the liquor licensing restrictions for Good Friday, we actually had to be off the premises no later than 2.30pm even though we were not consuming alcohol. This meant a hurried end to our nice relaxed lunch, which was a bit unfortunate.
While we were leaving I was approached by a guy I know and some of his friends. He complained that Guernsey was over-regulated. He was very disappointed that they were, in his words, effectively being told to go home. That day there were two groups of people, one drinking alcohol and the other not, both being negatively affected by the current restrictions. The aim of our policy letter is to adjust the regulations in order purely to provide consumers and licensees with more choice than they currently have on those two days of the year. I’d just like to add that the committee went out to consultation with all licensees, parishes and other stakeholders. The overwhelming feedback was in support of our proposals. The Cornerstone were consulted but did not contribute any feedback either for or against.
DEPUTY MARC LEADBEATER.