Row in liquor licensing body halts vote on off-licence reform

A row within the Commmission on Liquor Licensing has prevented a vote on policy towards the off-licence trade being taken. The vote was expected to be in favour of liberalisation.

One member of the commission resigned after a row erupted over a letter he sent to another member. The letter, from Mr Paddy Early, a representative of the Independent Liquor Licence Reform Group, said his members - small and medium-sized supermarkets - would boycott Irish Distillers products once liberalisation came into effect.

Mr Early made the threat in a letter to Mr Michael Murphy, an IBEC representative on the commission and a director of Irish Distillers. Mr Early favours liberalisation and wrote to Mr Murphy complaining about his intention to vote against.

An effort by the commission's chairman, Limerick solicitor Mr Gordon Holmes, to have the vote on the off-licence trade taken before dealing with the controversial letter, was not successful. Following Mr Early's resignation it was decided to defer the vote until a new member was appointed.

Ms Ailish Ford, director general of grocers' organisation RGDATA, has been nominated by the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Mr O'Donoghue, to replace Mr Early on the commission and has accepted the nomination. The commission now hopes to take the vote on the issue before the Easter break.

It is expected the commission will vote in favour of retail outlets being allowed sell beer and spirits in the manner in which they are currently able to sell wine.

To sell beer and spirits, supermarkets need to buy a pub licence.

The commission was set up by Mr O'Donoghue to conduct an overall review of the liquor licensing system. The failure of the commission to reach any sort of consensus on the off-licence issue is seen by some involved as a significant failure, since it faces the much more difficult issue of advising the government on overall policy towards liquor licensing.

"The Government is fudging the whole issue by setting up the commission," said one source. "Taking on the publicans' lobby is a job for the politicians."

Mr Early said yesterday he felt that IBEC, which represents many of the "major players" in the drinks industry, should be leading the campaign for change rather than just "sitting on the fence" or voting against change.

Mr Holmes, in a statement, said that while correspondence between members of the commission was "quite normal and to be expected, both the tone and content of this correspondence was wholly inappropriate and was considered by the commission to be quite unacceptable".

"It was potentially damaging to the good working atmosphere that exists within the commission. The issues arising from this letter were discussed by the commission and, at the end of the discussion, the member who had initiated the correspondence tendered his resignation with immediate effect."