Another fudge by Dermot Ahern

[0neill32]

We have long been campaigning for a proper nightclub licence, and he thinks he is delivering one.

He is certainly not.. what a fudge... no change to club opening times.. so how is this a nightclub licence then?

We will have a direct campaign coming up soon, and i will be back with details about how you can get involved, if you so wish.

B. O Neill.



Bill to reform late opening for pubs


CARL O'BRIEN, Social Affairs Correspondent

NEW LAWS will make it easier for pubs or nightclubs to stay open late at night instead of owners having to repeatedly apply to the courts for extensions to their opening hours.

However, there will be no change to restrictions on opening hours which came into force over the summer, according to a Minister for Justice spokeswoman.

Under the terms of a Sale of Alcohol Bill, which is expected to be published soon, a "nightclub permit" will replace the current system of exemption orders for venues seeking to stay open late.

This will allow pub or nightclub owners to secure a permit for a period of time - possibly three or six months - rather than having to seek an exemption order from the courts in order to stay open late at night. The move is likely to be welcomed by nightclub owners who have complained in recent weeks that recent changes to the law aimed at combating alcohol abuse are making it increasingly expensive to run their businesses.

The Intoxicating Liquor Act which came into force last July has forced nightclubs to stop serving alcohol by 2.30am instead of 3.30am and pubs to close by 11.30pm instead of 12.30pm.

The legislation also scrapped "theatre licences" which allowed nightclub owners to serve alcohol all year round until 3.30am, without having to secure exemption orders.

A spokeswoman for Minister for Justice Dermot Ahern yesterday rejected reports at the weekend that the overhaul of laws governing the sale of alcohol would reverse some of these new measures which came into force over the summer.

She said that when the Minister introduced the recent measures in the Dáil, he made it clear he would bring forward a Sale of Alcohol Bill later in the year which would bring all the licensing laws into a single comprehensive statute.

"While the new Bill will incorporate some additional reforms to licensing law, it will incorporate, not reverse, the changes already introduced in the Intoxicating Liquor Act 2008," the spokeswoman said.

"In particular, there is no question of a U-turn in relation to theatre licences. The closing-time rules introduced by this year's Act will continue to apply, ie nightclubs and theatres will be subject to the special exemption order conditions. The same applies to other reforms introduced in the 2008 Act."

She said a publication date for the new Bill would be available when the Government publishes its legislation programme in late September. Dr Joe Barry, a public health campaigner, said yesterday he was hopeful the Government would continue to take positive steps to help combat alcohol abuse in the new Bill.

"I think there will be fierce lobbying against the legislation from vested interests, but I think we should accept the bona fides of the Government which says it is trying to improve matters in this area," he said.

Nightclub owners have also been objecting to increases in the price of special exemption orders, which rose from €100 to €300 over the summer.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Justice said the fee increase was "appropriate in the context of concerns about the sale of alcohol, its easy availability across a multiplicity of outlets and public order issues arising from binge drinking".

She added: "Considerable costs arise on a regular basis for the State, not least the courts themselves, in dealing with the fallout from public order issues following late night drinking. Over 91,000 such orders were issued by the courts in 2007."

© 2008 The Irish Times

[0neill32]

and were off again on the lobby trail... next up is the Sale of alcohol bill.. oh i cant wait to read it.. REALLY!!!!

[0neill32]

Dear Minister Ahern
I am writing to you to ask you to consider this scenario in the current Economic climate. I am an independent club promoter and event manager in Dublin for the last 15 years.

Last year you brought about new legislation regarding the opening hours of bars and nightclubs across the country. Sadly and wrongly in my opinion this was clumsily lumped into a bill that for the most part seemed to be about tackling underage drinking and the opening hours and operating practices of Off licences.

No one in their right mind would argue against the government tacking this very serious issue of alcohol related problems in this country, but i for the life of me cannot understand what this has to do with bars and nightclubs and when they can and cant operate. With the passing of the intoxicating Liquor bill last summer, it has reduced the operating times of many nightclubs across ireland by 30%. 90% of nightclub operators i know do not even bother opening on sundays as the closing time was brought back to 1am.


It's an easy headline to print when 1400 jobs are sadly lost in Dell in swift swoop, but the figures we are looking at are FAR MORE than that in our industry that has been hampered by ill advised government policy on the trading hours of bars and nightclubs. What we want is a simple reversal to 3.30 am 7 nights a week, to give us all in this industry a fair crack at the whip. In what other industry in the country would the government get away with telling a threatened business, that to add to their woes, that their operating / trading hours are now also going to be cut. Try telling that to Dell, There would be uproar.

There is another bill coming up for reading in the Dail soon, The Sale Of Alcohol bill, and there are amendments on that bill, to include a proper nightclub licence, all very welcomed, but it still is only cutting and pasting the old opening times into it.

We are dj's, we are promoters, we are bar staff, we are waiters, we are flyer staff, we are bar backs, we are cloakroom staff, we are taxi drivers, we are fast food staff, we are shop staff and we are here today to send one clear message to this Minster and his government.. 'HANDS OFF OUR JOBS, AND HANDS OFF OUR LIVELIHOOD.



For over 10 years now many in the nightclub industry have been lobbying for sequential closing, and the granting of a swath of theatre licenses in the last few years gave hope that finally our words were not falling on deaf ears.. Many gardai I have spoken to have (of course off the record) expressed even more horror at this prospect..

For the first time, the leading Garda in Pearse st, the busiest licensed are in the country, is on the public record in an interview with Kitty holland in the Irish Times pre christmas, saying that Sequential closing in his district was clearly the way forward.


Where is the sense in spending hundreds of million of euro advertising our Ireland around the world only for us to sell tourists a pig in a poke.. When will this government realise that not all tourists to Ireland want to come on a coach tour to Johnny fox’s, when will this government not wake up and realise that there is a very valid and vibrant youth tourism market that Ireland just does not exploit.. And indeed that millions of euro leave this island every year, by disaffected and disfranchised Irish citizens.. At a time when all we hear around us the r word, recession, if these proposals come to pass, they can then add another r word to the vocabulary of the youth of Ireland, redundancy..



Kind Regards,



Buzz O Neill

[DeathKnell]

Dermot Ahearne is another clueless Fianna Fail Kvnt. You may forget about enlightened forward thinking legislation. It, like himself will always be tainted by gombeenism and cute hoorism.

[lostexpectation]

Dr Joe Barry doest get out much