Coalition announces inquiry into Indigenous alcohol harm

The Abbott government has set up a parliamentary inquiry into the dangerous use of alcohol in Indigenous communities.

Indigenous affairs minister Nigel Scullion mentioned governments at all amounts have to unite to tackle the epidemic of alcohol abuse “or risk condemning these communities to a lifestyle of alcohol-fuelled poverty”.

“This inquiry will emphasis on very best practice to shape plans and practices that will reduce the scourge of alcohol in Indigenous communities,” he mentioned in a statement.

The decrease house’s standing committee on Indigenous affairs will look into what aspects contribute to hazardous consuming across Indigenous communities and ways to minimise alcohol-connected harm.

The committee’s chair, Liberal MP Sharman Stone, explained the inquiry was not singling out Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as the only group that has issues with alcohol.

But she stated there is concern those in the community who do drink, do so at riskier levels that have greater well being-connected impacts.

The Northern Territory’s shadow minister for Indigenous affairs criticised the inquiry when it was very first proposed in January. Ken Vowles termed the inquiry “insulting” and “disgusting”.

Submissions to the inquiry are due by 17 April.

In a separate advancement, on Thursday it was announced bars in Darwin had agreed to restrict the variety of drinks patrons can purchase in a bid to lessen alcohol-associated violence in the city.

Underneath the Australian Hotels Association initiative, member bars agreed to restrict drinks to four per consumer during happy hours and soon after midnight, and to ban shots soon after 1am.

Shots with an alcohol material of far more than 51% will be banned altogether.

“It’s important we’re witnessed as part of the remedy and not just element of the issue,” explained Mick Burns, senior vice president of the AHA NT.

For the past year chief minister Adam Giles has refused to employ a Newcastle-sort answer to alcohol-associated violence in the NT, and advised an AHA awards dinner last year that the NT’s drinking culture was a “core social value”.

He denied his government was also shut to the liquor sector.

“Darwin is not Newcastle, it is not Kings Cross, it is not Wollongong, “ he informed reporters on Thursday.

“We don’t want to be a government of a nanny state that puts in area rules without having working in cooperation with regional individuals.”

The new regulations apply only to the Darwin city centre, and there are no strategies to roll it out across the rest of the Territory.

Lord mayor Katrina Fong Lim mentioned Darwin’s night-time economic system was well worth $ 444m a year and “it’s quite important that men and women participate” in it.

The NT government has pointed to statistics exhibiting that per capita, alcohol consumption in 2012-13 was 4% less than the preceding year, and that wholesale provide dropped two%.

Coalition announces inquiry into Indigenous alcohol harm