Friday, January 16, 2015

No luck for wine-addicted Quebec - booze class suit action shot down again

   After two years of holding our collective breath (Isn't that a long time to go without breathing?- Chimples) an appeals courts judge has ruled on a request to slash booze prices in Quebec.  
   Jean Rene Jasmin originally alleged in Quebec Superior Court in April 2012 that the liquor commission's pricing policies violated the Consumer Protection Act.
   Jasmin argued that the government booze monolpoly's prices were 30 percent too high.
   Sadly, perhaps even tragically for us all, Judge Sansfacon tossed the case out in September 2013.
  has also been rejected.
This is too expensive
 And now Jasmin's attempt to appeal the decision
   So there's no hope. Nothing left to live for. Just hit that bottle now, if you can afford it.
   Quebec's monopoly liquor board is a sort of Wal Mart.
   It buys and sells so much wine that it can almost dictate its purchase price.
   And yet the SAQ doesn't end up injecting all that much cash into the provincial economy, at least compared to other provinces and territories .
   Failing privatization, depanneurs should at the very least be permitted to offer a much larger selection of wine. Over four of five SAQ purchases consist of wine, as demand continues to skyrocket to 160 million litres consumed in the province per year, while purchases of spirits and beer have stagnated.
   Depanneurs are convenient and eco-friendly, as people often travel to them by foot. And yet they've been starved out by provincial government policies over the last few decades. So if you're not going to let the prices tumble, at least let some others benefit from the wine-o-mania that has gripped the province.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Love to get comments! Please, please, please speak your mind !
Links welcome - please google "how to embed a link" it'll make your comment much more fun and clickable.