Researcher
Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education
Summary
On 8 January 2015, the NSW/ACT Alcohol Policy Alliance (NAAPA) wrote to the leaders and party secretaries of six political parties and two independents contesting the New South Wales (NSW) state election in March 2015. Specifically, NAAPA wrote to the Liberal Party of Australia NSW Division (Liberals), NSW Nationals (Nationals), Australian Labor Party NSW Branch (Labor), The Greens NSW (Greens), Christian Democratic Party, Shooters and Fishers Party (Shooters and Fishers), Mr Alex Greenwich MP and Mr Greg Piper MP.
The letter asked recipients to respond to 15 questions on alcohol policy, based on the NAAPA Election Platform Not one more:
- Will you/your party support the provision of $600,000 over four years for domestic violence services and alcohol and other drug services to develop shared models of care?
- Will you/your party support a ban on alcohol promotions on state property, such as public transport and bus stops?
- Will you/your party support the introduction of saturation policies for liquor licenses and introduce regulations that consider the density of outlets in granting new liquor licenses?
- Will you/your party support replacing the Liquor Promotion Guidelines with robust legislation and regulations on alcohol marketing?
- Will you/your party support the provision of $800,000 over four years to develop and fund a Community Defenders Office based on the successful Alcohol Community Action Project (ACAP) pilot?
- Will you/your party support a review of the existing Community Impact Statement scheme?
- Will you/your party support maintaining the ban on political donations from the alcohol industry?
- Will you/your party support introducing a code of conduct on the engagement with the alcohol industry that reflects the World Health Organization’s (WHO) position on industry involvement in policy development?
- Will you/your party support the provision of $10 million over four years to develop and fund an ongoing public education campaign on the health impacts of alcohol consumption?
- Will you/your party support the provision of $1.2 million over four years to establish a Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) clinic at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead in Sydney?
- Will you/your party support the provision of $2 million over four years to fund a brief intervention program for alcohol in primary care and emergency department settings?
- Will you/your party support expanding the Magistrates Early Referral Into Treatment (MERIT) program to include alcohol?
- Will you/your party support limiting extended trading to no later than 3am, introducing a 1am lockout and abolishing all existing 24 hour liquor licenses?
- Will you/your party support the development of a state-wide alcohol harm prevention plan?
- Will you/your party support mandating the collection of alcohol sales data across all of NSW?
Outcomes
Responses were received from five of the six parties and one Independent: the Coalition (a joint response was received from the Liberal and National parties), Labor, the Greens, Christian Democratic Party and Alex Greenwich MP.
The responses received are provided verbatim in this report and were categorised as being ‘supported in full’, having ‘some action committed’ and having ‘no commitment made’.
When examining policies that are either ‘supported in full’ or had ‘some action committed’, the Christian Democratic Party (CDP) received a score of 15/15, followed by the Greens (14/15), the Coalition (11/15), Alex Greenwich (8/15) and Labor (7/15).
When only examining policies that are ‘supported in full’, the CDP received a score of 15/15, followed by the Greens (14/15), Alex Greenwich (5/15), Labor and the Coalition (both 3/15).
Labor were most likely to have had ‘no commitment made’ to policies (7/15), followed by Alex Greenwich (8/15), the Coalition (4/15) and the Greens (1/15).
