MPS push for pints over Easter
Labour MP Kieran Mcanulty has put up a member’s bill to remove restrictions on alcohol sales over Easter, Christmas and Anzac Day, saying if someone wanted a pint on those days they should be able to have one without getting a full meal.
Act MP Chris Baillie, has also prepared a bill to remove the shop trading hours and alcohol restrictions over the Easter holiday – but not Christmas or Anzac Day.
Mcanulty’s bill would remove the current laws, which require restaurants and pubs to sell alcohol only to people who are dining on Easter Friday and Sunday or Christmas Day, and not to sell alcohol before 1pm on Anzac Day.
“It doesn’t quite sit right with me that on Easter Sunday, you can go to the pub and order a plate of chips and that doesn’t get you a beer – but if you chuck in a bit of fish, you can get a pint.”
The requirement for pubs to close at midnight on the day before Easter Friday and Sunday has caused problems in some areas such as Queenstown as all the customers leave at the same time.
The last time the law relating to alcohol sales on the holidays was changed was in 2016, when former MP Paul Foster-bell’s member’s bill to allow RSAS to offer alcohol after dawn services on Anzac Day was fasttracked through Parliament. It meant RSAS no longer had to apply for a special license.
Act leader David Seymour said Act would consider Mcanulty’s request – “but we might respond in kind by asking him to support Act’s bill on shop trading hours”.
Baillie had “a much better bill” that would repeal both the shop trading hours laws and the sale of alcohol laws for the Easter period. That bill would not change the laws for Christmas or Anzac Day, days Seymour said merited the protection.
National Party justice spokesman Simon Bridges said he would have to take the bill to caucus to consider, but Labour had the numbers to pass it unilaterally.
Mcanulty had caucus approval to put up his member’s bill, but alcohol laws are usually treated as conscience issues, not party-line votes.
The restrictions applied over what should be some of the busiest days of the year for hospitality, which was particularly important for those struggling to recover from the Covid-19 restrictions, he said.