Many, many concerns were raised on the drinking culture of younger people on Friday and Saturday nights and the mindless vandalism that occurs in the early hours of the morning. The Council share these concerns and have voiced these in the form of a submission to Parliament on the Sale of Liquor Act.

I am of the view it is a community problem and cannot be solved by just a single thing, say closing bars an hour earlier. The whole community needs to take some responsibility, perhaps by making sure they don’t buy alcohol for their teenage children and allow them to wander the streets after consuming large quantities of RTDs (ready to drink) or beer at home. It would be a nasty surprise for Havelock North citizens to come out on to the streets after 11pm to see the state of many of the teenagers when they lurch into the CBD, after hiding their bottles of alcohol in bushes and behind walls, to consume and discard on their way home at 3 or 4am! I feel many parents do not want to know what their teenagers have been up during the evening, as long as they are quiet on their way to their bed and don’t wake them up!