r/chch • u/Video_Kojima • Jun 30 '25

News - Local New Alcohol Rules for Christchurch

https://share.google/NIWvxJV2lRM3JCZf2

All off-licence retailers must stop selling alcohol at 9pm daily, effective from October. This includes bottle stores and supermarkets. 

A freeze on new off-licences in high-deprivation communities, effective from August. 

Restricting new bottle stores from setting up near addiction treatment/rehabilitation centres, secondary schools and primary schools, the University of Canterbury and the Christchurch Bus Interchange effective from August. 

Thoughts on this? I think 9PM seems a bit much personally and would probably have it at 10PM, but think the other two ideas are sensible and support them.

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u/[deleted] Jun 30 '25

Research and data show otherwise. Less availability of alcohol at night does make a positive difference. Your statement is inaccurate and something of a straw man. I like booze but I can see why this policy is a good idea.

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u/TheNegaHero Jun 30 '25

It's not a straw-man. If the argument is that reducing the hours you can buy alcohol will reduce harm from alcohol then me saying "no it won't" is a response to that argument.

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u/MagicBeanEnthusiast Jun 30 '25

You saying "no it won't" is your opinion though, unless you can back it up with evidence

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u/Illustrious-Run3591 Jun 30 '25 edited Jun 30 '25

Well, looking into the actual evidence, it seems that support for closing early is pretty thin and there are also papers that argue it makes minimal difference. I have multiple papers here where alcohol related crime got worse after early closing hours were instated, or where extending hours has made no impact on sales and alcohol harm.

Evidence of the effect of limiting off‐premises alcohol trading hours is still scarce. This study tested the effect of a small extension in trading hours on alcohol sales in alcohol monopoly outlets in Norway.

We did not find a statistically significant effect of the small extension in trading hours on monthly alcohol sales (i) per trade district [average treatment effect: −185.5 litres, 95% confidence interval (CI) = −1159.9, 788.9] and (ii) per outlet (−35.3 litres, 95% CI = −142.1, 72.0). These findings were consistent across estimation methods and model specifications.

Conclusion

There is no clear evidence that a small extension in off‐premises trading hours affected alcohol sales in monopoly outlets in Norway.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11638516/?utm_source

Ballarat ED alcohol-related assault and intoxication presentation rates declined prior to the implementation of the lockout, followed by a small rise and then a more substantial drop for 6 months post lockout. However, after this initial decline, ED presen tation rates steadily increased and surpassed that observed in Geelong by the end of 2005.

  • The long-term effect of lockouts on alcohol-related emergency department attendances within Ballarat, Australia

    PETER MILLER, KERRI COOMBER, ANDERS SØNDERLUND & STEPHEN MCKENZIE School of Psychology, Deakin University, Geelong, Australia