Council quashes suggestions legalised alcohol could return to Aurukun as sly grogging escalates
Suggestions alcohol could return to the dry community of Aurukun have been rebuffed by the local council.
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Suggestions alcohol could return to the dry community of Aurukun have been quashed by the local council.
Aurukun Shire Council has had alcohol restrictions in place for 22 years but the Mayor Barbara Bandicootcha had campaigned to bring back limited alcohol before she was elected earlier this year.
If given approval, a tavern could operate with restricted opening hours, customer quotas and limits on the strength of alcohol sold.
But Aurukun Shire Council Acting CEO Juanita Warner said the council was not preparing to make an application to the state government for a licence to re-open a limited hours tavern.
“The council would need to consider a motion to review the community’s Alcohol Management Plan before applying for a permit,” she said.
“There is no such motion in place at this time as any review of the Alcohol Management Plan needs to be driven by the community.
“A review of the Alcohol Management Plan would involve extensive community consultation involving the Justice Group, Council, police and other government agencies in Aurukun.
“It would include gauging support for or against having a limited hours tavern in the community and the outcome of this would be reflected in the recommendation whether or not to make an application to the State Government for a licence to re-open a limited hours tavern.”
Federal Member for Leichhardt Warren Entsch said the prohibition model had decimated the community.
“It won’t be an open hours facility, it will be a social place,” he said.
“Somewhere you can have food. Limited on the strength and amount of alcohol you can buy, and you can enjoy a social drink.”
Currently the maximum penalty for possessing alcohol is a $120,975 fine or 18 months imprisonment.
If it did happen, the reintroduction of alcohol in Aurukun – an originating model of alcohol management around the country – could be a test for the continuation of alcohol management policies across the country.
The first Alcohol Management Plan was designed and implemented in late 2002 by the Aurukun community, and AMPs were subsequently adopted in 15 communities across the state.
Of those 15 Queensland communities, alcohol is completely banned in Aurukun, Napranum, Woorabinda and Wujal Wujal with others subject to strict limitations on alcohol consumption.
Following Aurukun’s 2002 model, AMPs were also adopted in towns such as Alice Springs, Port Augusta and in other remote Indigenous communities right across the Northern Territory and Western Australia.
The move comes amid a recent spike in black market liquor entering Cape York communities.
In Aurukun, town sources say sly groggers had been hiking for miles through bushland, making false suicide reports and taking boats to avoid detection in Aurukun, ramping up fears of another grog-fuelled riot.
“It’s out of control,” one man, who asked to remain anonymous, said.
“If it keeps on increasing and money comes into the community we might see another riot.”
On New Year’s Day 2020, two teenagers murdered a man leading to six homes being firebombed and burned down as members of the community rioted following the death. Speaking after the riots, then Far North police Supt Geoff Sheldon said the violence was an eruption of “long standing” tensions, fuelled by black market alcohol.
There were 147 liquor offences (excluding in drunkenness) in the town over last 12 months – while just two people charged in February.
Government data shows there has been a big surge in April with ten offences compared to two in February when the wet season was in full swing and roads were blocked.
From February to April there has also been a rise in assaults particularly serious assaults
One source in the community said $12 bottles of wine were being sold for $600 and bottles of rum for $750.
There has also been an increase in alcohol coming into the community since it stopped raining and all roads to Cairns gradually opened in recent months.
He said “sly grog” had been detected in the community at the time of the riots despite a large seizure of alcohol in the days leading to New Year.
Another source said sly grog runners know where the general areas police road checkpoints are.
One tactic being used is letting one or more of the passengers walk through the bush for several kilometres and meeting back up with the car further down the road.
“They are also bringing in by boat,” the man said.
“These people are making an absolute fortune from it.”
He said that people were also making false reports of suicides and assaults, or even false reports of sly grogging to distract the very limited number of police in town.
The Queensland Police Service said “it is committed to working with remote communities including Aurukun, to keep them safe and reduce the risk of alcohol-fuelled violence”.
Aurukun currently has no detox centre or alcohol counsellors.
Mr Entsch said the state government needed to build detox facilities in Weipa, Cooktown and the Peninsula.
“Rather than building the proper infrastructure in the community, they just said let’s ban alcohol – it doesn’t work,” he said.
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