Community always comes first, says liquor accord

The Narrabri Liquor Accord always puts community first when it comes to managing a fun, safe environment for patrons at licensed venues in the Narrabri District but they aren’t afraid to enforce the rules either.

Manager at the Namoi Hotel and secretary of the Narrabri Liquor Accord, Jack Pixley says that safely running pubs in a small town like Narrabri is a collaboration between all local venues, and they keep each other in the loop.

“All licensed and retail premises from Narrabri are involved in the Accord, including venues like the Black Snake Distillery, Liquor Land, Tattersalls on behalf of BWS, and the RSL,” said Mr Pixley.

In early 2019 a survey conducted by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare confirmed alcohol consumption is significantly higher in regional and remote areas of Australia when compared to major cities.

The local liquor accord is a partnership between licensed venues and retail business, local council and the police who come together to develop safe environments around licensed premises.

“Liquor accords take proactive steps in their community and surrounding areas to maintain the safety and well-being of their patrons,” said Mr Pixley.

“We convene and talk about events that have happened and figure out the best strategies for managing the situation.

“Every venue will have a different way of handling things.”

An important part of the accord is addressing community issues, such as alcohol-related incidents, anti-social behaviour and violence, and figuring out the best strategies for dealing with these incidents in a way that is fair and deters the same thing happening again.

“A big thing that people may not be aware of is that the police keep us updated on community issues at the time, they take us through crime rates and keep us updated on domestic violence,” said Mr Pixley.

“There isn’t really a trend that happens where behaviour escalates over a period and generally, 99 per cent of the population will do the right thing and act responsibly.”

The most successful measure that the group has introduced is the multi-venue barring policy which takes the “barred from one, barred from all” approach.

The full ban is not something that is taken lightly and was put in place to stop anti-social behaviour such as assaults and fights travelling between venues.

“There’s definitely a degree of difficulty in managing these incidents because the last thing we want is for things to escalate, but sometimes there’s nothing we can do about it,” said Mr Pixley.

“The police will obviously be quite involved in the process when we consider banning someone because it has to be quite serious for it to get to that stage.

“There can be serious repercussions from a full ban and the last thing we want is to cut off someone from all the pubs but sometimes we need to send a clear message that that kind of behaviour will not be tolerated.”

While Jack only came back to his position as a pub manager at The Namoi two months ago, he said the recent years’ changing of hands between pubs is why it’s so crucial to keep all lines of communication open, to keep growing ties and working together.

“It’s important for us to keep talking because plenty of venues have changed hands in the past few years, so we need to make sure all our venues are on the same page about how to safely manage our pubs,” he said.

“The Tattersalls has a new licensee, The Wilga, and the change of lease at The Crossroads, including myself having just come to The Namoi after being at The Tattersalls.

“There are a lot changes in the community that we need to keep up to date with too, we need to know what’s going on so we can manage our pubs accordingly and work together to ensure that we’re all on the same page.”

And with so many pubs in our small proximity, this kind of collaboration between venues and liquor licensees is crucial to keeping our second homes away from home safe and enjoyable for both staff and regulars.

“We know what’s going on in the community, we all communicate and keep each other in the loop,” said Mr Pixley.

“We know everything that’s happening and have a Whatsapp group to keep each other informed about any ongoings throughout the night.

“It is very rare that someone will walk into one of our other venues without us knowing if they’ve been unto before they arrive on our doorstep.”

While the Accord stays vigilant about managing safety around alcohol, the mission to keep the good times rolling is still first and foremost.

“The most important point is that we all want to have a safe, fun, friendly environment for everyone, and all our locals deserve to enjoy that right,” said Mr Pixley.