Excise Tariff Amendment (Draught Beer) Bill 2025, Customs Tariff Amendment (Draught Beer) Bill 2025
Mr BURNS (Macnamara) (11:51): What an honour and pleasure it is to follow the member for Melbourne, my new neighbour in this place. The Yarra River used to be the border between Melbourne and Macnamara, but now we have this wonderful amalgamation of the southern and CBD parts of Melbourne. One thing that the member for Melbourne and I share is some of the best places for people to come and visit in our magnificent city, whether people go to the Melbourne electorate to see some of the most amazing sporting or cultural events in the country or they navigate south to the arts capital of the country, in Southbank, and right through so many other parts of my electorate.
What people know is that, if you're going to come to our neck of the woods, you're going to have so many options of amazing small and big establishments to visit and enjoy. It's something that we stand on in this place, wanting to support our amazing local businesses and establishments that make Melbourne vibrant, make it exciting and make it fun but also provide jobs to our wonderful hospitality workers.
The Excise Tariff Amendment (Draught Beer) Bill 2025 and the associated bill are all about supporting our local businesses and the amazing hardworking staff who work in them. It is really hard work to be a hospitality worker. People who work in our local establishments work really hard to serve people and ensure that those businesses can function.
They do so to help represent our city and ensure that people who are visiting our city, as well as the locals who want to support their local pub or bar, have a great time. At first glance, these bills might seem a little technical, but the beer excise is something that can add up and make a financial difference to a lot of small businesses. Around the country, we have members who are privileged to represent these great local and vibrant small businesses—pubs and breweries and all those sorts of establishments—and something that we take great joy and pride in is supporting them and ensuring that they have lower costs so they can focus on running their business and not worry about the escalating costs of excises such as these.
I mentioned at the start some of the overall wonderful vibes that you can receive and experience in Macnamara, but this is not an exhaustive list. I sincerely apologise to any of the establishments that I have forgotten. Some of my favourite local establishments that represent the array of iconic venues that we have in our community are ones that locals love, that people who visit our city love and that really shine and welcome people in, whether they're from our community or from other parts of Melbourne or Australia or they come as part of our vibrant tourism industry.
The Espy in St Kilda is one of the most iconic venues, and it recently had a big renovation. I can happily report to the House that the floors are a lot less sticky, but the decor and the time that you can have at the Espy is as good as ever. The team who redid the Espy did a marvellous job, and it is absolutely heaving on a Saturday night.
For anyone who wants to go to St Kilda and have a great night out or a great meal, I definitely encourage the Espy. We've got the Railway Hotel in South Melbourne, an iconic local business that's been there for a long time. Back in my university days, I occasionally ventured down to the Windsor Castle Hotel, which was a good venue for a Wednesday night.
You could go and have a good beer down at the Windsor Castle Hotel. It's tucked away behind a little nook right in the heart of Windsor. Mr Rae: Does it have a vegan menu?
Mr BURNS: I won't take that interjection, but St Kilda East has become a real hotspot for night-life. There are some great local bars as well. The local taphouse was one of the first places where you could get fantastic beers on tap that were some of the best that you could get in Melbourne, and the food there is also excellent.
I definitely recommend coming down to St Kilda East as well. People unfairly think of St Kilda and near the beach, but St Kilda East is such a great part of my local electorate and has so many great establishments on Fitzroy Street, which is obviously the night-life capital of Melbourne, and so many iconic venues, such as the Prince of Wales, which also has a smaller establishment in Chronicles Bar, which I will give a shout-out to.
It's a young, local team who established this and are popping up a few other venues as well. Chronicles Bar is always welcoming, and the team there work really hard. It's a great small, local business that's making it work on a street that desperately needs really good businesses and people walking up and down there, contributing to and supporting our local businesses.
In Southbank, there are so many different options around and so many amazing food options as well. An old favourite of mine is the Belgium Beer Cafe. The team of Macnamara once did our Christmas party there, and it was a great day.
The team there really looked after us, and they are wonderful people. All of these local stories and all of these local businesses—we want them to continue and thrive. The costs of excises to run these on-tap beers add up, and this is a core part of their product business, and we want to ensure that they are able to thrive and continue to manage all of the costs of running their businesses in a way that makes it sustainable so that they continue to be there.
When you ask people, 'What are the things that you love about our local community?' it's having the places that are familiar, having places that are unique and having places that are unique parts of our local community, just like the Vineyard, which was established in 1886 on Acland Street, just down the road from my office, where we launched our campaign for the election earlier this year.
The team of the Vineyard were just absolutely wonderful in welcoming the over-200-people-strong Labor contingent who were gearing up for the election campaign. We had musicians from the Australian National Academy of Music perform. We had the Deputy Prime Minister come and launch the campaign.
It was all hosted in this iconic venue that has been around for, as I said, over 100 years. These are the sorts of businesses that this excise freeze will support. These are the sorts of businesses that we're here to support right around the country.
In Macnamara, every single pub, every single bar, every single bowls club and every single venue does more than just pour a beer; they support jobs, they support local communities, they bring people together, they're the homes of good and fun parts of our amazing city, and they're also why people come to Melbourne to visit, to stay and to enjoy. There's nothing better than a summer's day in Melbourne where— Ms Ryan: At the Espy!
Mr BURNS: At the Espy—I take interjection from the government whip. I did mention the Espy! I reported to the House earlier that, after the renovations, the floors are less sticky, but the times are just as good.
We're very pleased to support these businesses, and I will continue in a moment. I seek leave to continue my remarks later. Leave granted; debate adjourned.