Well, the report's on the Minister's desk by now, and I'm hoping we'll get to see it soon. I just discovered that the group chair, Dr Gordon Holmes, was up in front of the Oireachtas Justice Committee back in February[/url:2ejeup83] and had some interesting things to say. For example:
[quote:2ejeup83]The manner and condition of sale of alcohol products in these outlets, including below unit cost selling, presented us with a major problem. To sustain any form of prosecution for breaches of any regulation, such as below cost selling, one must be in a position to prove it. One must know the baseline cost. To find this information I visited a number of producers. I had a fascinating meeting in Cork with Heineken last week. The company was extremely helpful and forthcoming, except when I asked for the cost it was charging. Prices were sensitive and the representatives could not tell me but I did learn the general principles.
...
With all of this information available to us, we realised we could do nothing to fix below-cost selling because we did not know what the cost price per unit was. This is a major difficulty for us because we would very much like to do so. It reflects what we were asked to do in many of the submissions made. It seems to be an extremely difficult problem, on which we did a significant amount of work. We met a large number of people and will meet many more. The position may change but it is difficult.
I do not believe people really want to see price controls introduced because they would not control the same item. This very day, I saw a Czech or Slovakian lorry delivering beer to Redmond’s in Ranelagh and a place close to our office. I do not know at what price the beer was bought. Below cost selling is a difficult issue on which to give coherent advice. It is a problem we must examine because the Minister specifically asked us to do so.[/quote:2ejeup83]
Towards the end, he says:
[quote:2ejeup83]I omitted answering Deputy Rabbitte’s earlier question as to whether I supported cafe bars. I favour cafe bars, although I am aware the Chairman does not. I will explain my reason. There is a large drinking population in Ireland. Our object in suggesting cafe bars was to get some of the drinkers from that group into a cafe bar instead of into the environment of drinking at home, binge drinking and drinking in pubs. The idea is to get them, particularly young people, to drink in a totally different society where there would be food, coffee and music available. We were not trying to encourage new people to drink. Ireland has enough drink outlets anyway and the idea that another outlet would mean more drinkers is nonsense because we already have far too many. Our object should be to lessen the number.
We were trying to offer a different type of outlet and get some of the drinking public to drink in this type of place, where they would drink less and in a more civilised way. It was an attempt but it was shot down, and we all know how. Unfortunately, it will not be resurrected. However, it is creeping in the back door. The words “cafe bar” appear on many premises now.
...
It is beginning to come in the back door. One sees premises describing themselves as cafe bars. They are providing alternatives. It is creeping in despite the opposition it faced from a particular section of the public. I hope that, although it will not be provided for in legislation, it will end up having some effect on the problems we have.[/quote:2ejeup83]
It sounds to me like his report will be full of sound reasoning but is destined to be ignored in the knee-jerk rush. We'll see.
