The Ford government is about to change booze retailing in Ontario. Billions of dollars are at stake.
The Ford government is about to change booze retailing in Ontario. Billions of dollars are at stake.
Looks like there will be some changes to where booze will be sold, imminently.
If it's what Dougie is pushing, I'm against it. Lol
Meh. I'm no fan of ford but the Beer Store is an oligopoly that needs to be toppled. It's incredibly inconvenient nanny state bullshit
The Beer Store isn't nanny state, it's not owned by the Ontario government.
IMI that is part of why the Ontario owned LCBO actually has a decent selection compared to the beer store. The beer store has a near monopoly with no reason to improve service, while we in Ontario actually own the LCBO and it has a vested interest in decent service.
So while the beer store sucks, it's not likely that beer selection will get any better if corner stores started carrying beers (just look at Quebec, even before moving to Ontario I often still bought my beer at the LCBO because they had a much better selection)
If Ford is able to do this while not reducing the tex income we make from the sales, I don't really care. But I won't hold my breath on that one
Even a broken clock is right twice a day
For me, the only real issue here is how big of a hit will provincial revenue take if the LCBO's market share is greatly reduced
Yeah, I wondered about that too
There is a well-known right-wing play to defund the government as a means to shrink it. Some cleverer person than me can recall its name
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Premier Doug Ford's government is preparing to change the rules on how beer, wine, cider and spirits are sold in Ontario, and there's plenty at stake — well beyond whether you'll be able to pick up a case at the corner store.
The looming reforms also pit a range of interests against each other, as big supermarket companies, convenience store chains, the giant beer and wine producers, craft brewers and small wineries all vie for the best deal possible when Ontario's almost $10-billion-a-year retail landscape shifts.
As the negotiations proceed, the Ford government faces its own internal dilemma between its competing desires of giving the free market more control of booze sales vs. keeping LCBO revenues flowing into the provincial treasury.
All sources expect the government to give notice by the end of December that it intends to terminate the contract that sets out the rules for beer sales in the province, known as the Master Framework Agreement (MFA), as also reported by The Toronto Star.
"The MFA has never been about choice, convenience or prices for customers, it has always been about serving the interests of the big brewing conglomerates, and that's what needs to be addressed," said Michelle Wasylyshen, spokesperson for the Retail Council of Canada, whose board of directors includes members from Loblaw, Sobeys, Metro, Walmart and Costco.
When Ford made his campaign promise to allow corner stores to sell beer and wine, he ignored the fact that doing so would have put the province on the hook to the big brewers for hundreds of millions of dollars, under the terms of the Master Framework Agreement.
The original article contains 1,829 words, the summary contains 265 words. Saved 86%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!