A unique joint submission

The Keep it 18 campaign is appearing before the Justice and Electoral Committee at 5.20 pm today in Select Committee Room 2 in Bowen House, to do an oral submission on the Alcohol Reform Bill.

The Presidents (or nominees) of Young Labour, Young Nationals, Young Greens and Act on Campus will appear together to talk to their submission, on why 18 and 19 year olds should be able to continue to buy a bottle of wine or a six pack of beer when they do the shopping.

It is the first time the four youth wings have done a formal joint submission to a select committee. Most or all the youth wings have also done individual submissions on the wider issues in the bill.

Their Facebook page has around 17,500 fans.

What strikes me as pertinent as that the voters of Botany have just elected 25 year old Jami-Lee Ross as the MP for Botany. And it is the fourth time he has been elected to office. He was elected to Manukau City Council at the age of 18, and did a good enough job that he got elected twice more – and then to Parliament.

This law would say that Jami-Lee, as an 18 year old, can not be trusted to buy a bottle of wine in a supermarket. However he can be trusted to sit on a City Council, where he would vote on Council spending, by-laws and policies – including the local alcohol policy for a district.