Lawmakers passed the outline of a government-initiated bill during a plenary session yesterday in the legislature’s hemicycle, which aims to ban alcohol sale to minors, i.e., those under the age 18.
The bill does, however, not ban minors from drinking alcohol at a private venue such as at home.
According to the bill, the Tobacco Prevention and Control Office will enforce alcohol control work.
The bill is officially known as Law on the Prevention and Control on Minors’ Consumption of Alcoholic Beverages.
Currently, while there is a legal ban on the sale of cigarettes to those under the age of 18 in Macau, there is no legal ban on selling them alcoholic beverages.
The bill proposes that alcoholic drinks subject to the proposed sales ban will be defined as those with alcohol by volume (ABV) of over 1.2 percent, while alcoholic beverages will be prohibited from being sold or provided to those under the age of 18 at public venues.
Some lawmakers spoke in support of the proposed legislation and expressed concern about how to prevent businesses from selling alcoholic beverages to minors and whether food containing alcohol will be subject to government oversight.
Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture Elsie Ao Ieong U said she believed it would be more complicated if the bill included official oversight of food containing alcohol, but the government was willing to add the relevant requirements during the bill’s upcoming article-by-article review and debate by a standing committee of the legislature.
Ao Ieong stressed that according to the bill it would be illegal to provide alcoholic beverages to minors in public places, and took the example of parents allowing minors to drink alcohol in restaurants, in which case the parents would be held responsible for providing the alcohol.
The bill proposes to bar anyone from hiring minors to sell alcoholic beverages or from employing them to provide such drinks at public venues, and also bar minors from “engaging in self-employment activities” that sell alcoholic drinks at public venues.
In addition, the bill proposes to ban the sale of alcoholic beverages to minors through any “remote” means, such as online shopping and courier services.
Ao Ieong said that when a supermarket cashier questions whether the buyer of alcoholic beverages is underage, he or she is presumed to be a minor if they refuse to show their identification.
The bill also proposes that a notice prohibiting the sale or provision of alcoholic drinks to those under the age of 18 must be displayed in clearly visible locations at all venues selling or providing such beverages.
Ao Ieong also said that future alcoholic beverage advertisements should have warnings such as “Excessive alcohol consumption is hazardous to health”.
The bill proposes that those selling alcoholic beverages to minors at public venues would be fined 20,000 patacas. The proposed 20,000-pataca fine would also cover those “providing alcoholic drinks to minors at public venues for commercial purposes”.
Digital pataca
During yesterday’s plenary session, the Legislative Assembly (AL) also passed the outline of a bill regulating Macau’s pataca issuance, which proposes that Macau’s legal tender will also cover digital currency, in addition to the current and traditional forms of currency, namely banknotes and coins.
Secretary for Economy and Finance Lei Wai Nong said that the bill was to meet the future development of digital currency. Lei emphasised that digital currency is not a cryptocurrency, and he stressed that the government doesn’t and won’t allow decentralised cryptocurrency to circulate in Macau.
In addition, the AL also passed an outline of a bill which proposes that parking fees for street parking spaces can only be paid by e-payment, as well as a 20-percent increase in the fines for motorcycle riders who fail to pay their street parking fees.
Currently, parking metres for street parking spaces do accept coins or Macau Pass cards.
Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture Elsie Ao Ieong U speaks during yesterday’s plenary session in the legislature’s hemicycle.
Secretary for Economy and Finance Lei Wai Nong speaks during yesterday’s plenary session in the legislature’s hemicycle. – Photos courtesy of TDM
