By Andy Young
The Australian Hotels Association (AHA) has responded to the Federal Senate committee's report into red tape in the alcohol industry.
The inquiry, chaired by Senator David Leyonhjelm made several recommendations including taxing alcohol by content, allowing packaged alcohol to be sold in convenience stores, petrol stations and supermarkets and abolishing restrictions on trading hours for liquor stores.
The AHA's CEO Stephen Ferguson told TheShout, that while it agrees with some aspects of the report the association will continue its conversations with the Federal Government about law and licensing changes.
"The AHA agrees that the government should implement evidence based policies aimed at promoting job creation, business growth and investment," Ferguson said.
"As all hoteliers would know, job creation and investment are best achieved on premise, rather than in the take away environment.
"AHA will be ensuring that any change by the Federal Government must take into account the capacity of hotels to generate employment, generate more GST revenue, support other industries such as live music, provide safe environments, and to increase social inclusion.
"Most of the other regulatory issues raised by the Senate Committee are clearly within the domain of the state and territory governments."
The final report from the committee will be issued later this year, which will require a Government response and a copy of the interim report can be found on the Parliament of Australia website.