Calls to overhaul alcohol tax to safeguard health
by Leon Gettler
Health specialists say the government has to implement major reforms to the alcohol tax to reduce binge drinking and safeguard the health of Australians.
An article by Julia Stafford of the McCusker Centre for Action on Alcohol and Youth and Curtin University health policy professor Mike Daube in The Medical Journal of Australia maintains that the pricing of alcohol is critical.
The overall tax on alcohol and the price of drinks, they say, needs to increase.
They argue that the government’s failure to act constitutes “gross irresponsibility.”
Under the system for alcohol tax at the moment, spirits are taxed more than beer, and wine is taxed on wholesale price and not on alcohol content.
According to Ms Stafford and Professor Daub, that means cask wine could be sold for as little as 18¢ per standard drink, or $1.80 a litre, making it cheaper than water,
What we have here, they say, is a system that’s tantamount to “a subsidy propping up the production of low-value wines”.
The system instead should target the heavy drinkers.
“A minimum price would restrict the ability of alcohol retailers to heavily discount products, thus undermining the tax strategy.” they write.
They said alcohol is a pre-eminent cause of preventable social and community harm, including violence and road crashes. That’s in addition to “many hidden and longer-term” issues.
Ms Stafford told ABC radio that cask wine is a great example of why the alcohol tax needs to be changed.
“Regulating the price of alcohol is one of the most effective approaches to reducing harm from alcohol,’’ Ms Stafford said. “We're talking about small increases in tax rates, very modest changes to the way that alcohol is priced and taxed, because that's what makes the difference.”
In its Federal Budget submission, the Royal Australasian College of Physicians says alcohol tax reform could help fill the government coffers, potentially generating more than $1 billion in additional revenue every year.
29th March 2016
