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An outback pub in Western Australia’s north found to have breached pandemic-era alcohol restrictions designed to crack down on liquor-fuelled violence has been ordered to pay back $25,000 it made while limits were in place.
The order for forfeiture could bring an end to nearly six years of legal proceedings concerning Derby’s only two pubs, the Boab Inn and the Spinifex Hotel which are owned by the same person, after one of the sites drew the attention of WA police back in 2020 after selling alcohol to a customer in front of an off-duty officer.
Western Australia’s state of emergency laws allowed the Liquor Commissioner to put restrictions in place over how much alcohol a person could buy in the Kimberley.
Police said in March 2020, when the restrictions had just come in, the local senior sergeant had gone to the Spinifex Hotel bottle shop while off-duty and saw a staff member sell a customer two blocks of Emu Export. The restrictions at the time meant customers were only able to legally buy a single carton.
The cashier told the customer they would need to process the two purchases as a separate transaction, and the off-duty officer said he then heard the staff member “[say] words to the effect of ‘be careful, they’ll see you on the cameras’ which was believed to be a reference to the closed-circuit television cameras mounted outside the Spinifex Hotel by the local shire.”
The hotel was issued an infringement notice, which it paid.
About nine months later, a visit from Liquor Enforcement found the pub did not have an approved manager on shift at the Boab Inn and was issued another infringement notice. The pub paid.
A later audit of the business found what police claimed to be another breach of restrictions between January 1 and January 31, 2021, after it was found there were sales exceeding the liquor limit for both the hotel and the inn.
In a decision issued by the State Administrative Tribunal this month, the company and its director were fined a total of $9000 over the conduct.
“The respondents have demonstrated insight into their conduct by paying the earlier infringement notices and pleading guilty to the charges in the magistrates court and in this matter by agreeing that disciplinary action ought to be taken against them,” the decision found.
In a separate decision, the Director of Liquor Licensing ordered the business to pay back about $25,000 it estimated it had received as a financial advantage during the alleged contraventions of the restrictions. The Director of Liquor Licensing said the money should be paid back to the Crown within four months, and the company agreed.
The decision follows a long saga for the Derby establishments, which successfully appealed a decision by the Liquor Commission to fine them $140,000 for “numerous and repeated” breaches of the Liquor Control Act in May last year.
That decision was ultimately overturned by the WA Supreme Court on appeal, after the court found the two pubs had been denied appropriate procedural fairness, and sent the matter back to the Liquor Commission to deal with.
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