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| Pitchers of beer going up as much as $5, pints up $2 under "Happy Hour"! |
The province
didn't 'modernize' liquor laws; they 'Liberalized' them.
Bill Tieleman’s 24 Hours Vancouver / The Tyee column
Tuesday June 24, 2014
By Bill Tieleman
"Two-fifty
for a hi-ball / And a buck and a half for a beer / Happy hour, happy hour /
Happy hour is here."
- The Tragically Hip, "Little Bones"
How on
Earth could anyone screw up something as simple as happy hour?
Welcome
to British Columbia, where the BC Liberal government isn't on the planet when it
comes to being clear on the concept of "happy hour," where bars, pubs
and restaurants can offer thirsty patrons a short break from overpriced
beer, wine and cocktails.
B.C.
Attorney-General Suzanne Anton announced
the "modernizing" of liquor laws Friday, and when it comes to happy
hour, in many cases prices will actually be higher, not lower, than before --
up to $5 more for a 60-ounce pitcher of beer and $2 more for a pint!
If the
BC Liberals can't even figure out how to introduce happy hour without making us
pay more, not less, for a simple drink, it's scary to think how they will negotiate
a critical taxation regime for liquefied natural gas that's worth billions of
dollars.
Getting
LNG right is a little tougher than happy hour!
Cry
into your pricier beer
The
province set minimum drink charges for happy hour above current prices, causing
drinkers to immediately cry into their more expensive beers.
"I'm
fundamentally disappointed in the government for this," Adam Chatburn, the
president of Vancouver's Campaign for Real Ale Society chapter, told
media.
"We
were really hoping they would take a much more adult and sensible approach to
minimum pricing for happy hour," said Chatburn. "Unfortunately,
they've decided to jack the price right up."
Yes,
that's right: the "BC Liberalized" happy hour means more expense
booze. You can't make this stuff up.
As
Steve Bauer of Vancouver's Pumpjack Pub explained
it: "The 60 ounce jugs are going up to a minimum of $15, tax out,
which takes you to over $17 dollars for a jug. A lot of people on this street
aside from ourselves and restaurants, you'll [have seen] them for $11,
$12. So that's all gone!"
Bauer
said the pub's 14-year tradition of selling a 17-ounce pint of beer on Sunday
afternoons for $2.90 will have to change, with the price jumping to $4.90 due
to the new rules.
That
means the minimum price
for an ounce of liquor is $2 and $3 for a 12-ounce beer or five-ounce wine.
Give
us a break
Sadly,
liquor is one area where the BC Liberals have made some positive changes,
drawing rare praise
from this column for allowing wine corkage in restaurants.
Saturday's
announcement
that B.C.-produced wine, beer, cider and spirits can now be sold in farmers'
markets, for example, is very welcome and overdue, as is letting children into
pubs with parents till 10 p.m. for "family friendly dining."
No one
wants dirt-cheap drinks or more drunk drivers on our roads, but most of the
civilized world, including Seattle, seems able to do happy hour appropriately.
So can
we just get a little break on an after-work drink? Or is that too much to ask?
Join my new
Facebook page Fix BC Happy
Hour -- so we can truly get happy!
.
28 comments:
Dear Mr Telemann
In Victoria and on the Gorge Road, the adult beverage servicers are most upset at all the new regulations. Two watering hole, I visit have raised prices because of the twenty-five cent per unit minimum price on draft beer. Twenty units is now five dollars. My only friend, Mr Van der Zalm as in HST must once again recute you and the Chris and fight for the good of the common man.Thank you.
The BC Libs manage to screw up most things. Happy Hour but bring more money for the drinks. I guess the government wants a few more tax dollars from the drinking folk
With a lot of things going on right now, the govnerment needs to waste time on "fixing" something that isn't all that essential? I mean after lengthy consultations regarding Happy Hour, and the outome, some are still not happy?
Suppose the government does fix it? Does that mean cheers and a statement "The BC Liberals did the right thing" or support? Hardly.
Must be a slow start to summer.
Or the whines are fermenting.
2017 looks to be a good year for BC Whine.
"The BC Libs manage to screw up most things. Happy Hour but bring more money for the drinks. I guess the government wants a few more tax dollars from the drinking folk"
Best way for that is to just forget drinking to excess to build up those tax dollars.
The responsible drivers will thank you for doing that DPL.
Interesting line though. Would you have said the same thing when the NDP raised up the taxes on beer not long after they became government?
Did Anton read only part of New Zealand's reason for moving to Minimum pricing?
Report summary
Previous studies have suggested that imposing a minimum price per standard drink of alcohol could reduce harmful alcohol consumption, particularly among young people, who consume the highest quantities of low cost, high alcohol volume products.
Regulating the minimum price of alcohol is a way to directly raise the price of alcoholic products regarded as being unduly cheap. This may prevent retailers from employing strategies such as discounting and loss leading, which are used to undercut competition and to promote purchasing of low priced products.
Approaches to minimum price vary among countries, but overall, the approach is relatively untested internationally. ........................
Snip
Recommendations
On the basis of the report, the Ministry of Justice recommends that a minimum price not be considered for introduction for five years. This would allow the alcohol reforms to bed in and their impact assessed, including the development and implementation of Local Alcohol Policies, which are likely to take up to two years to come into full effect.
I just returned from a week in Bali. Go into any supermarket there and you have a choice of Bintang beer, Heineken, local & imported wines, Chinese liquor - all kinds of stuff. Cold, too.
Yet Canadians are, as usual, stuck in the 1970s. Regulation, regulation, regulation. Can we dump the judeo-Christian alcohol Puritanism, please, let the free market have a go and move into even the 20th century...?
Dear Mr. Tieleman
Sorry for spelling your name wrong in my first message.I find it hard to believe there are very few comments posted on the subject.I can follow all comments except North Van's outline.I have no idea what was typed. Carry on Bill.
well it works this way. People go to "happy hour" because in part its a convient time to have a few drinks, after work. Now its an even better time for some to make more money and the government to make more on taxes.
As to natural gas, well the b.c. lieberals are doing really well there as Norm Farrell explained. In 2005/6 the province took in about 2 1/2 Billion more per yr than they did in 2012/13, even though production increased. So if a government, which pleads poverty and needs to mine for money in the pocket of children to the tune of $17M per year, can find a way to loose $2 1/2 billion in income from the gas industry in 6 yrs, you know they are oh, so fucked.
The lieberals aren't "business" people. They're a bunch of wannabees running around try to sound important while ensuring their business associates and friends make as much money possible at the expense of the taxpayers and children of this province.
Dear Bill
Please consider the following fact. A certain hotel on the Gorge Road East near Hillside offer a beer for only $3.99. When the bill arrived, it cost me move THAN nine dollars for two as I was with an associate. Tax was then included and the two glasses supplied were of the fourteen unit variety. At 25 cent times 14 would be only $3.50. What a rip off. In addition, this watering hole also had a Keno vending machine that would not accept coins, the staff suggested it has never accepted anything but bills. Needless to say I recommended they bar that machine and invite a better one. The point is certain adult beverage dispensers try to fool their customers. I will report the incident to both Lotto, Consumer Affairs and the LCB. Will provide more when I know more.
"well it works this way. People go to "happy hour" because in part its a convient time to have a few drinks, after work. Now its an even better time for some to make more money and the government to make more on taxes."
It also works this way. There's no need to go to "happy hour" because in part its a convenient time to have a few drinks. What's next a return to separate entrances for men and ladies?
The NDP government made more on taxes when they increased the tax on beer.
"As to natural gas, well the b.c. lieberals are doing really well there as Norm Farrell explained. In 2005/6 the province took in about 2 1/2 Billion more per yr than they did in 2012/13, even though production increased. So if a government, which pleads poverty and needs to mine for money in the pocket of children to the tune of $17M per year, can find a way to loose $2 1/2 billion in income from the gas industry in 6 yrs, you know they are oh, so fucked."
What does LNG have to do with Happy Hour? Stay on topic.
"The lieberals aren't "business" people. They're a bunch of wannabees running around try to sound important while ensuring their business associates and friends make as much money possible at the expense of the taxpayers and children of this province."
Well that makes the NDP being not "labour" people, doesn't it? The NDP are a bunch of wannabees running around trying to sound important to their labour union friends and associates (such as the BCTF).
Hay Mr. Bill, I just read the wonderful comment by an anonymous person at July 3 21:25 and I agree with what was suggested. Except for the reference to the NDP and teachers. My Oak Bay girl friend's daughter and her husband are teachers in PG. Mrs Clark wants to fight with that organization,she will be sorry. Those children and their parents and in my case a grandparent will never forgive that witch for her attacks.
To return to the subject, in my opinion,it is change but not for the better.
loh dear Anonymous at 2125 you don't think its not convent to go for a drink after work and you don't think its not a good time to make money. Well? Did the NDP raise taxes on beer? the working persons drink, oh my, the godless souls. raising taxes and now the liberals have done the same. raising taxes is a good way to raise money.
But really A. Mr. Nestaken Saquire is very much funnier.
I thought there was gas in beer. why else does it bubble up and give people gas. and they are both commodities which the government tries to make money on and both aren't doing so well
ah, the NDP not being about labour/unions then. Haven't exactly seen the NDP jumping up and down on behalf of the teachers unions, not that the NDP has always been labours best friend or did you forget Barrett legislating ICBC staff back to work.
You see A. any government which is elected will one day become your employer, some of us know that.
now go have a beer or go save some money and make your own. have a good time.
"loh dear Anonymous at 2125 you don't think its not convent to go for a drink after work and you don't think its not a good time to make money."
For some, not me. I'm nor interested in getting into the sauce after work. But if it is for others, so be it. Remember, the NDP never ever implemented "Happy Hour" when they were in government. They raised taxes on beer instead.
Well? Did the NDP raise taxes on beer? the working persons drink, oh my, the godless souls.
According to many. And since anyone who earns a paycheque be it the boys on the shop floor to the manager responsible for keeping an eye on the delivery and the sales people, the administrators, who exactly is "working person?" Doctors are working people as are nurses. Administrators and people like Bill here who run a PR company are also working people.
"raising taxes and now the liberals have done the same. raising taxes is a good way to raise money. "
Up to a point. The NDP decided to do that with beer.
"I thought there was gas in beer. why else does it bubble up and give people gas. and they are both commodities which the government tries to make money on and both aren't doing so well"
What you see may be carbonate in it just as there is in Coke and Mountain Dew. Carbonate makes drinks fizzy.
ah, the NDP not being about labour/unions then. Haven't exactly seen the NDP jumping up and down on behalf of the teachers unions, not that the NDP has always been labours best friend or did you forget Barrett legislating ICBC staff back to work.
NDP is a friend of labour, get real if you think it is not. The BCGEU dumps thousands of dollars into NDP campaigns. As does CUPE.
You see A. any government which is elected will one day become your employer, some of us know that.
Actually it's the other way around. Dix didn't see that.
now go have a beer or go save some money and make your own. have a good time.
I do like a beer but don't hang around pubs alot.
Dear Bill as in Mr Tieleman
As the first commenter it appears I may be the last.Therefore, I will suggest Mr.Van Der Zalm, as an election promise did lower the price of beer. Not much but lower. To continue, for my second annual open house on the West Gorge in Victoria ,I purchased five liters of beer in a small keg. Price was thirty dollars. Fifty liters would be ten times that figure. A fifty liter keg would cost a bar around 130 dollars. Please do the math as to the mark up. Trust the public will consider the expense that social drinking is of great value to bar owners.
When the taxes on beer went up, few complained. The NDP did it anyway.
No one thought or told the NDP to put in "Happy Hour" or allow sales of beer and liquor in stores.
The BC Liberals proposed "Happy Hour", everyone was happy about that.
The BC Liberals bring in "Happy Hour" everyone said "about time".
Some were not happy about "Happy Hour".
More BC Whines in the Pourhouse.
Hey Anonymous 10/07 & 20:29
Nice comment and especially as to the reference to "Pour House". Would you believe I spill more than I drink. LOL. Now because of the new rules, I will be drinking more at home on the West Gorge in Saanich and less at the pourhouses. At my first annual open house in June, I offered Skinny Girl wine. It was a great hit despite being two dollars more than my Oak Bay's German wine.Bottom line is I will hold more annual open houses this year.Next year I also plan to have more than one annual house that is open. All are welcome by invitation only. Mrs Clark and her gang on that lieberal ship of fools are welcome as I have tar and feathers. Good as in Buy.
"Mrs Clark and her gang on that lieberal ship of fools are welcome as I have tar and feathers"
So, you're going to give a demonstration as to what you look like in tar and feathers?
Have you already practised your tar, feather and whine act?
The Dour Happy Hour. Only in BC.
Hey anon at Sunnyday 16:43:00. Your comment is beneficially as Barley Sandwiches is and are the drink of the working man.My oak bay GF and other ladies prefer WINE.Skinner Girl is popular. The working girls on John street in Victoria, prefer money so as to support habits as in BAD. A song suggests "good girls go to heaven but bad girls go everywhere". Another thought is " I have friends in lonely places were the whiskey flow" and then ends with a comment as to being a "social disgrace". I have been Jaguar Les for five years but as of yesterday I obtained another. It feeds my ego.Also in partnership with my son, we obtained a 41 year old midget as in MGB. As I was on a roll, I financed a Toy Echo for my seventeen years old granddaughter. She is a real winner and work at Winners in Duncan. I feel I am boring Bill's gentle readers, therefore, I will end by stating draft beer and such drinking establishments are of great value to the working MEN.
"Hey anon ,since 2002 BC Liberals have raised beer prices by 16 percent to the highest beer prices in Canada.Guess the NDP did that too huh.Thanks for the stupidity troll."
Yeah so? DId anyone cry in their beer to the extent of it being a major political issue in 2005? No? in 2009? No. In 2013? No. The NDP did the first thing right after being government, they raised the taxes on beer. Thanks for your stupidity, troll.
Have a drink while remembering the good old days of Mike Harcourt, Glen Clark, and the infighting that took place.
"I feel I am boring Bill's gentle readers, therefore, I will end by stating draft beer and such drinking establishments are of great value to the working MEN."
Nestaken Squire - You are boring. You're forgetting one thing. Any guy who works for a paycheque be it sales manager, administrator, accountant, marketing manager, fireighter, nurse, business owner, the geeky guy in the IT department is a working man.
and many of those don't go near pubs. They're there if one so wishes, but being at a pub is not compulsory for the working man.
Hello 14/07/ at 21;52.
Now if I am boring you why did you read my message and why did you comment. Was my message read to you and your response typed by someone else as you appear to be low IG-ed. Anyway I do not find your comment as boring. However, rather than be an anon, please offer a handle. Note and note carefully, when you see my name just not read any more.
Now if I am boring you why did you read my message and why did you comment. Was my message read to you and your response typed by someone else as you appear to be low IG-ed.
First, entertainment. It's interesting to read about someone who has lost themselves inside a bottle and can't find his way out.
(Much like the the NDP these days).
What is "low IG-ed"? That's a new one or is it pub-speak?
Anyway I do not find your comment as boring. However, rather than be an anon, please offer a handle. Note and note carefully, when you see my name just not read any more.
Anonymous is a label. If you can't differentiate between anon posters, there's obviously something in your drink.
But we gather you have some kind of out of the bottle talent, such as singing "How Dry I am" or "Louie Louie".
Enjoy your time with Johnny Walker as both of you keep eye on the Baby Duck.
Keep it up. Soon you'll join Bill's collection of BC's finest whines in his pourhouse.
There are nine separate comments by between one and nine anonymous commenters. By using "anon" Bill's faithful and gentle reader can not connect the dots as to who is who in the anon zoo. Regardless, I enjoy Mr. Tieleman comments. He along with Bill V and Chris are my heroes. They, with the help of a majority of BC voters destroyed that baby HST.A long the way, Mr. Cambull was reduced to a whimp and more or les, tarred and feather as Heir harper exiled him to London. Our Lady Leader in the palace should have deported that drunken driver.I could add more but my West Gorge (ous) Girl Friend is bored. She has been drinking Skinny Wine and is now demanding I return to bedroom duties.In closing, I will answer that anon's other questions and comments tomorrow. Be patient.
"There are nine separate comments by between one and nine anonymous commenters. By using "anon" Bill's faithful and gentle reader can not connect the dots as to who is who in the anon zoo."
As one anon said if you can't figure out the difference between opinions, then there's something in your drink, and we're not talkin' ice or lemon here.
"Regardless, I enjoy Mr. Tieleman comments. He along with Bill V and Chris are my heroes."
Bill VanderZalm and Chris Delaney are old news. You probably did not like VanderZalm when he was Premier (neither did Bill or any of the NDP back then).
"They, with the help of a majority of BC voters destroyed that baby HST."
They just did the burial. HST was doomed from the start. It was put into place in Ontario, but not here, simply because the geniuses at the BC Liberals didn't do the homework. It was doomed to fail.
"A long the way, Mr. Cambull was reduced to a whimp and more or les, tarred and feather as Heir harper exiled him to London.
Easy on that "Heir Harper" Nazi junk, sunshine.
"Our Lady Leader in the palace should have deported that drunken driver."
Deportation is a federal level matter, not a provincial one. Learn a few basics.
"I could add more but my West Gorge (ous) Girl Friend is bored. She has been drinking Skinny Wine and is now demanding I return to bedroom duties.In closing, I will answer that anon's other questions and comments tomorrow. Be patient."
So another concert of the Bedspring Symphony followed by a morning whine.
Nice.
Hey stupid you are boring my Oak Bay girl friend. She stated that you have no original thoughts but just copy cat my ideas. What is your room number at crow bar hotel?
Hello Mr Tieleman It is good to have an Oak Bay GF. Expensive but well worth the money just like my second Jaguar.To get to the point an anon was really mouthly, but one word from OBGF silenced that pain in the BUTT.I trust you and your friendly readers are laughing as much AS WE ARE AT THE EXPENSE OF THAT LOW LIFE PERSON.Thank you Sir William as you should be Knighted.
"It is good to have an Oak Bay GF. Expensive but well worth the money just like my second Jaguar"
Sounds like you're one of those one percenters.
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