THE GOVERNMENT IS SCREWING YOU

The quote was crude but accurate.

About twenty years ago on radio I opined that “you can now legally get a screw in Melbourne on a Sunday but you can’t get a screwdriver”.

It was at the time that the State Government was (rightly) liberalising the laws on prostitution and brothels but, at the same time, persecuting a small businessman named Frank Penhalluriack for committing the horrendous crime of opening his suburban hardware store on a Sunday.

In months of Monty Pythonish governmental bloody-mindedness Penhalluriack was hauled through the courts, fined more than half a million dollars, jailed in Pentridge and had a heart attack.

We even had the edifying spectacle of burly policemen storming Frank’s nuts and bolts shop and “arresting” his electric drills and sanders in lieu of the fines.

Those draconian days were back in the news in 2003 when the Bracks Government buckled to union pressure and banned most trading on Easter Sunday.

If you had more than twenty employees you could not open. That shut down most of the CBD and shopping centres. And if you did open you risked a $10,000 fine.

Who would enforce it? Well, at first the Government said “shop inspectors”. But here’s where Monty Python comes in again. The inspectors have Easter Sunday off.

So, shades of Penhalluriack, the Government decided that Police would do the job.

But then the Police Minister Andre Hapless Haermeyer said that Easter was a traditionally busy time for police. Lots of people away on holiday. Busy roads. Busy burglars in empty homes.

And he said the job of policing stores that opened illegally would get a low priority. So the government had a new law that the Police Minister virtually said wasn’t worth enforcing.

Last February I, among others, exposed the fact that the new Easter Trading law had more holes than the Swiss cheese you would not be able to legally buy from Coles. The ill-conceived, dogmatic and repressive legislation had originally banned almost everybody.

After we exposed that major service station chains would be forbidden from opening --the Bracks Government whipped through a quick amendment to change their own fraught legislation.

They eventually exempted petrol stations and chemist shops and restaurants and fast-food stores and video rentals.

When it was pointed out that places like Stawell (with the Gift that weekend) and Torquay (with surfing) would suffer horrendously the Government started handing out territorial exemptions as well.

I raise the issue again because, during the 2003 Christmas “silly season”, the Government did another quiet semi-back flip and announced changes to the Easter Follies that will now allow hardware stores and nurseries to open.

But last week Treasurer John Brumby was still adamant that big stores like David Jones and Myer and Target must close their doors on Easter Sunday.

And so must Safeway ands Coles. Why it is a sin to buy a bottle of Coke at Safeway on Easter Sunday but not at a service station or milk bar is beyond me.

Adding to the hypocrisy was that fact that they would close cinemas on Easter Sunday but two religions would be exempt: AFL football and Crown Casino.

And speaking of religion: What about the separation of Church and state? And I am not just saying this because I am an atheist.

The majority of people in Victoria are not practising Christians. They may nominally be on their census forms but churches are hardly overflowing. Even at Easter.

In making last week’s announcement about finally exempting hardware stores the Treasurer John Brumby said it was a “fair compromise”.

He said: “During that Easter period, there are many families, people, home handy-persons who like to get out, go to the hardware shop, buy things and do jobs around the home.”

Exactly. Why didn’t they think of that before this union-forced oppression was even considered?

Why not let shopkeepers make up their own minds? If you want to open then open. You want to shut up shop for a whole week at Easter? That’s your personal and professional and commercial decision.

Easter Sunday is a busy day for retailers. One of the biggest trading days of the whole year. The weather is still good. It’s the first major break since Christmas and New Year. Most people have already had Good Friday off and Easter Saturday – which is now an official public holiday – and by Easter Sunday the shopping centres are looking pretty inviting.

So let it be. Some employees, permanent and casual, welcome the money.

But the biggest issue is this – and I know it is starting to sound like the Hinch mantra: Get out of my life. Shops should be open when people want to shop. Pretty simple really. If your trading hours are wrong, you’ll die.

Years ago you couldn’t buy bread for about five days over Christmas. You couldn’t shop in a supermarket after the bell went off at noon on Saturdays. You could not buy meat – the most perishable commodity around – after 5.30 p.m. weekdays and from noon Saturday until Monday morning.

This whole Easter Trading ban law is wrong. It should be scrapped.

It is a step back to the days when nothing was open on a Sunday except the back door. Frank Penhalluriack, I salute you.

January 4, 2004

.©Copyright Derryn Hinch 2003