What happens when the government decides that it’s the moral police and doesn’t like a common Australian pastime, so it taxes it into oblivion?
No, it’s not a joke waiting for a punchline. Far from it, actually.
Businesses close and people lose their jobs, is what happens.
Brewing giant Lion this week announced it would be closing the James Boag brewery in Launceston after 145 years of beer production.
Boag’s has always been brewed in Tasmania with Tassie water for Tassie drinkers, including varieties brewed specifically for Tasmania and not available elsewhere – and supply for the mainland has, in recent years, been brewed on the mainland.
Now, all Boag’s beers will be brewed on the mainland and exported to Tasmania.
The rot began with mainland brewing, done to cut down on transport costs.
Fair enough, all businesses have to look after the bottom line. But the problem is it’s becoming harder and harder to run a business in Australia – particularly in the alcohol industry.
Things are no better in beer.
Independent Brewers Association chief executive Sabrina Kunz told the ABC that the closure of Boag’s Launceston operation was down to the cost of doing business.
“Our breweries are simply closing down, we’ve lost something like 80 breweries over the last two years nationally,” she said.
She pointed to the alcohol tax as something that needed to change – and she is right.
Lion pointed to declining beer consumption as one of the main reasons it decided to close Boag’s Launceston brewery. And why might that be?
The federal government has more or less orchestrated this outcome by making the cost of doing business in Australia extremely prohibitive, especially for smaller operations, and those in the alcohol industry have to deal with taxes on top of that which make their products more expensive.
Wine, beer and spirits all have different levels of tax applied to them, with spirits facing the highest rate followed by beer and then wine.
James Boag’s Brewery is closing after 145 years.
And 42 people who will be laid off from Boag’s in Launceston.
The tax on beer and spirits goes up twice a year in line with inflation while wine is taxed at 29 per cent of its wholesale value.
We Australians pay some of the highest alcohol taxes in the world.
For beer, only Norway and Finland collect more tax than us – we have the third highest beer tax in the world.
It has nearly doubled in the past 20 years, above the rate of inflation, and by more than 20 per cent since 2020 alone.
Every six months since 1988 there has been a tax increase for beer.
About $20 of a slab of beer goes directly to the government.
The tax is so high that the federal government makes more money each year out of the beer tax than it does out of the tax on gas extraction.
People are drinking less than they used to – and is it any wonder, when the government is so greedy?
The government is, basically, achieving what it wants to. It has decided that drinking is a bad thing so it will tax it to drive down drinking and make a nice mint in the process.
But, in that process, it is killing Australian jobs, such as the 42 people who will be laid off from Boag’s in Launceston, and like cigarettes, it is now driving people to an illicit alcohol market.
The cultural loss of James Boag’s Brewery is significant.
Recent research found nearly a third of bottle shops in Victoria, NSW and QLD were selling illicit grog.
Mark my words – history will repeat.
And for Tasmania, in this case, the cultural loss is significant.
I have visited the Boag’s brewery in Launceston and it was excellent, including a tasting of beers you can’t get on the mainland.
People in the north of the state drink Boag’s and people in the south drink Cascade – and never the twain shall meet.
I spent an enjoyable evening in the Sports Garden Hotel in Launceston last year watching the State of Origin and drinking Boag’s XXX ale because it was a local product and I like supporting local.
Now, I suppose, I’d have to hope there was a small brewer on tap or settle for some other mass-produced beer from the mainland.
All that history sacrificed at the altar of government moralisation and taxation.
Humans are naturally tribal and while that obviously extends to national pride, it is often more micro than that.
Caleb Bond is blaming the closure of Boag’s brewery in Tassie on the government’s beer tax.
Australians pay some of the highest alcohol taxes in the world. Picture: NewsWire/Martin Ollman
We feel an affinity for the communities from which we come and we support them.
I may have been born in Australia, but I was also born in South Australia and I will forever be South Australian.
I live in Sydney and have lived in Melbourne but I will always be loyal to the Adelaide Crows. I buy Coopers beer and I like McLaren Vale wines.
Why would someone in northern Tasmania bother to drink Boag’s when he could drink any other beer from the mainland?
In this growing country we are increasingly forced to forget local, because the economy dictates we must. I think that is sad.
Lion did the same thing as it will to Boag’s with West End in 2021, ending 162 years of South Australian Brewing.
I don’t think I’ve touched the stuff since.
And this will continue because the government wants it to.