4 minute read
From The President
by Boylen
AHA|SA CALLS FOR TOUGHER PENALTIES ON CRIME AND REAL REFORM
The AHA|SA used its Annual General Meeting lunch to highlight key issues to the Members of Parliament, ministerial advisors and senior personnel from SAPOL and CBS, who were all in attendance.
High on the list was concerns was the alarming rise in crime and anti-social behaviour and the growing impact it is having on our members.
We stressed that after generations of policy failure, real action is urgently required to protect our members, their staff and the wider community. The long-standing approach of ‘deny, defend, defer’ must end.
The AHA|SA is calling for:
tougher penalties for offenders
enhanced security measures
increased police resourcing Hoteliers throughout the State are being asked to do a disproportionate amount of the heavy lifting in crime prevention.
Whyalla is the most recent region to now have liquor restrictions imposed upon them. These restrictions are difficult and costly for hotels to manage.
I am not convinced the high level of cooperation provided by licensees to implement these requirements is understood, nor is it fully valued.
And there is overwhelming evidence that such measures simply shift the problem. They do not solve the problem. For example, the Adelaide CBD restrictions
have led to unsavoury issues moving wider than the inner city.
Someone pinching the odd six pack is annoying but the real issue is the well-known repeat offenders who steal large amounts of alcohol on a very regular basis. They do so with scant regard to any consequences.
It is a very unpleasant, and too often an unsafe work environment for our staff. And it is a heavy cost for our owners to shoulder
We offer no criticism to SAPOL, which deploys its resources in the best possible form.
But these repeat offenders - organised groups using intimidation and violence in a sustained mannermust not be allowed to re-enter our stores without repercussions.
So, we are seeking three changes of approach:
This repeated criminal activity needs to be met with the appropriate jail terms.
Our members are investing huge sums of money in crime prevention measures. It is beholden upon government to financially support our members to make their stores safer for our staff - and the wider community. The Northern Territory Government has partnered with hotels to help fund a range of security measures.
There must be a stronger intent to fix the issue of anti-social behaviour that we all observe on the streets, and this should include increased police resourcing.
CARD PAYMENTS
Our hotels are battling constant increases in their costs in an environment where it is difficult to pass on these increases to our customers.
At a time when governments need to be offering maximum assistance to small and family businesses, the Federal Government’s ambition to ban debit card surcharges - and potentially credit cards - from next January creates yet another burden.
Preventing costs from being passed on means this will become another expense for small business. This is after higher wages, insurance costs, rents and produce costs have already hit operating margins.
Should card surcharges be abolished, this will undoubtably add to inflation as venues increase prices for cost recovery.
Any surcharge ban will hit cash users too, as price increases would be applied to all customers.
We will have the situation where cash users are subsidising card users – and everyone will have to pay more.
The major supermarkets pay a tiny fraction of what a typical business pays in card fees.
They pay 1c in each $100 compared to an average pub paying over a dollar.
We don’t want our industry to become a duopoly of small business versus the big liquor chains owned by supermarkets, where small business people are being treated unfairly by payment service providers and the card schemes.
This is yet another example of small business finding it even harder to compete because they do not have the same bargaining power.
The AHA at a national level has met with the Reserve Bank on this matter and joined forces with the Independent Payments Forum and other industry groups to best defend members.
We are calling for regulatory reforms to significantly reduce the cost of card payments and level the playing field for small business and their customers.
We are also seeking a cap on interchange fees and having debit cards separated from high-cost credit cards that increase the blended rate.
