Drinking Age - Govt's Latest News Release

[Indiana_Jones]

Time for a drink...

COCKTAIL

-Indy

[Lou Girardin]

Time for a drink...

COCKTAIL

-Indy

I don't go to gay bars.

[Lou Girardin]

In Italy, Denmark, Belgium, Germany and France it's 16. Switzerland it's 14 in parts. And I have no problem at all with all of those things being dropped to 15. Remove it completely, I don't mind.

The thing is the majority of the 18 years old do have the maturity to handle the responsibilities the law gives them. They must do otherwise there would be significantly less 19 year olds. If society is going to hell in a handbasket why does it still work?

See people only see the ones who are causing problems. You don't hear about the others. You never hear about the one who doesn't drink that gives his mates a lift back from the party. You never hear about the one who decides he's going to make the world a better place. And you certainly never hear about the one who's just being normal.

Because that doesn't sell newspapers. People want to read what confirms their views of the world.

Anyway ultimately it's about choice. If you want exceptional people you need to give people freedom to screw up. They have to be given the choice to buy alcohol and then choose to be responsible.

That's very touching. But alcohol related problems are increasing among the under 20's. They have proved they're not capable of handling the responsibility. When they can drink like the Italians, French, Spanish etc then they can have a lower drinking age.
It's all about earning the right to drink.

[Coyote]

The drinking age is laughable. I know 13-14 year old girls who are already getting pissed and knocked up every Friday or Saturday. The guys tend to be a year or so older

I however have never been drunk. I'm not popular enough

[Clockwork]

How will they "earn" this right once they are prohibited, when they nay-sayers will simply say "remmeber what happened last time the drinking age was 18".

Why do people assume that its only 18-20 year olds causing societies drink related problems?

And why should the innocent and responsible ALWAYS end up loosing their rights and privileges to curb the excesses of idiots?

For a predominantly right wing bunch of individualists that regularly bemoan the nanny state interfering with their freedoms, there suddenly seems to be plenty of advocates for depriving the freedoms of others.

[Ixion]

Well, why NOT have a drinking licence (but only for under 25s please. Leave us old buggers out of it.)

Young volk take some sort of course, and get a licence. They already have to show ID all over the place, so it would be no extra problem to stamp a "Booze OK" endorsement on it. And if they got into trouble the licence could be revoked.

[Clockwork]

It could to be used to limit access to licensed premises and off-license sales, people could get around it by getting their mates to supply the booze off-licence BUT if you were required to be a license holder (i.e. under 25) you could make it a summary offence to be found with excess breath/alcohol in public.

[chickenfunkstar]

That's very touching. But alcohol related problems are increasing among the under 20's. They have proved they're not capable of handling the responsibility. When they can drink like the Italians, French, Spanish etc then they can have a lower drinking age.
It's all about earning the right to drink.

Who are 'they'? All under 20's?

Most of my friends and I have been drinking fairly regularly since about 16 - 17. I've been to a fair few parties since then, and I can only remember 1 fight in that time. That was only a minorish scuffle between 2 people I didn't know in West Auckland. I'd consider myself to be fairly typical for my age.

I'm not suggesting that no problems at all are caused by alcohol, but i'm certainly not gonna take 1 News / Paul Holmes' word for it.

I think that this argument is kinda academic anyway. Underage people are always gonna have access to alcohol, regardless of what the purchasing age. My parents have always encouraged me to drink responsibly, i've been having a beer with dinner from the age of about 7 or 8. When I was 16 - 17 mum would buy me a dozen or whatever to take to a party. I can't see how this would be different with 'irresponsible dole bludging KFC eating TAB spending parents' either.

Prohibition for 18 - 20's has never / will never accomplish anything meaningful.

[Jeremy]

That's very touching. But alcohol related problems are increasing among the under 20's. They have proved they're not capable of handling the responsibility. When they can drink like the Italians, French, Spanish etc then they can have a lower drinking age.
It's all about earning the right to drink.

Prove it. Find the stats to back up your claim that alcohol related problems are increasing in the under 20 age group. I'm fairly certain that you can't because a preliminary search the auckland uni library site says that there's no affirmitive studies in NZ.

Also I think you'll find that all of those countries consume more alcohol than we do. http://www.alcohol.org.nz/NZStatisti...PostingID=1833

And none of this special license business for under 25 year olds. We aren't "special citizens" we have to follow the law exactly the same as you do. We are either adults or we aren't. It's akin to saying that people over 25 don't need a license to drive because they're over 25...

[Ixion]

..
And none of this special license business for under 25 year olds. We aren't "special citizens" we have to follow the law exactly the same as you do. We are either adults or we aren't. It's akin to saying that people over 25 don't need a license to drive because they're over 25...

Well, not quite . You have to follow the law as do older volk. But the law is sometimes different. F'instncae , I am allowed (I think ) 80 summats per wozzynot of alcohol per gigathingy of breath. Or 400 other summats . You, being young , aare allowed less. I dunno what, cos I never bothered 2 find out, cos we didn;t have any of that crap when I was young enough for it to be relevant. but yours is a lot less than mine. And publicans are supposed to check your ID cos you look under 30 or summat, but don't have to look at mine cos I am obviously over 100

But, for what its worth, I personally don't agree with any set rules. Trying to control, what people drink by making laws about who can buy the stuff is never going to work.

[scumdog]

Lotsa laws are like the liquor ones - illogical to younger ones.

I.E. You need a firearms licence to buy a slug gun at 16 - but not at 18 - but you need a firearms licence to buy a regular rifle etc - but you can't get one until 18.

And as far as stats to prove alcohol related problems are increasing for under 20s?
Just ask a street cop for anecdotal evidence, a lot of those offences are not documented officially.

And drink driving is worse for younger ones compared to 8 or so years ago or at best has not improved.

"Young ones know the score, they're not the problem, it's the old school hardened drinkers that are the problem" Yeah right!!! Pfffft!

[Jeremy]

And drink driving is worse for younger ones compared to 8 or so years ago or at best has not improved.

Possibly because the drinking age was only lowered seven years ago. Also it's impossible to tell, the dataset is really small and has no determinable shift in proportion to the drink driving of the other ages groups. Which to me would suggest the opposite, that changing the age limit did not have a determinable detremental effect [you'll have to excuse me, I can't remember whether this holds true, it's been a while since I've done hypothesis testing in stats].

Really though this paints a scary picture. The alcohol limit is lower for this age group remember. Set the alcohol limit the same as the other ages groups and you'd find the proportion of drink drivers in this age bracket would nearly vanish, but nothing would have changed. As for the majority of this age group it's above their legal limit but nowhere near the limit for those over 25.

I'd prefer the reverse though, I'd wish they lower the limit. Zero would be a really nice number. Because then the drivers are never tempted to have "just the one". But guess which age group complains about this.

[Bloody Mad Woman (BMW)]

[QUOTE=Jeremy;747063]Prove it. Find the stats to back up your claim that alcohol related problems are increasing in the under 20 age group. I'm fairly certain that you can't because a preliminary search the auckland uni library site says that there's no affirmitive studies in NZ.

Forget these ponsy stats - they are certainly not the be all and end all. - go to the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous - they never get into the stats - talk to the Salvation Army people that have bridge programmes - they can't keep up with the demand.

I do voluntary service in this area - not only are the particpants getting younger and younger - they are also into the drugs/party pills at the same time - there is no moderation apparent at all in these people.

The problem isn't helped by politicians - crikey alot of them are raving alocholics - I've served enough of them at high classs functions - where "the policy makers" were invited. I don't intend to name drop but I've served a couple of prime ministers their "speciality drinks" - and other politicians - then at the end of the evening they are poured into their chauffeur-driven vehicles (paid by the taxpayer). These functions were held at discreet venues where the public don't go!! or would come in contact with.

I'm certainly not against people drinking - as long as they can handle it.

An what am I doing awake at this ungodly hour and it's the weekend!!!

[scumdog]

Possibly because the drinking age was only lowered seven years ago. Also it's impossible to tell, the dataset is really small and has no determinable shift in proportion to the drink driving of the other ages groups. Which to me would suggest the opposite, that changing the age limit did not have a determinable detremental effect [you'll have to excuse me, I can't remember whether this holds true, it's been a while since I've done hypothesis testing in stats].

I'd prefer the reverse though, I'd wish they lower the limit. Zero would be a really nice number. Because then the drivers are never tempted to have "just the one". But guess which age group complains about this.

Sorry, forgot it was 'only' seven years ago, seemed longer than that
Jeremy, just come out some Saturday night with me in summer and I'll show you all the problems first hand that statistics don't show about young drinkers, the problems were not there to that extent prior to the lower drinking age..
Behaviour, health, assaults and unexplained STDs all linked to 14-16 year old age groups and alcohol.
Sure, people use to drink young when the age was 20 anyway but not to the extent now and not in pubs (down here anyway) and making violent dicks of themselves out on the street.


And the breath alcohol thing? I agree - or maybe lower the adult level to the youth one.

[Flatcap]

Sure, people use to drink young when the age was 20 anyway but not to the extent now and not in pubs (down here anyway) and making violent dicks of themselves out on the street.

A large part of the problem nowadays is a lack of respect for society and police and the law generally. In my day (jesus I sound like an old codger) the lads would go out boozing, get up to mild shenanagins and go home. None of this throwing bottles at police and assualting ambulance personnel.

I can't see how raising the age by two years is going to cure a lack of morals and social awareness.


Also - surely it is better to drink in a pub, where there is a degree of control, than to have your older mate buy from the bottlestore to drink in the park...?