The history of the LCBO is rife with the contradiction of making money off a social vice they take pride in suppressing, and its existence is based in a sense of moral superiority that it knew what was best for Ontarians when it came to alcohol consumption.
However, this moral superiority is contradicted by the fact the existence of this Crown corporation includes a largely forgotten history of racism, sexism and paternalism.
The LCBO opened its doors on June 1, 1927, with a lineup of customers eager to purchase alcohol. Journalists of the time described the scene as disgraceful, and the government agreed, since it placed the employees behind steel bars and would not allow customers to purchase alcohol without their individual purchasing permit.
These permits were given out only if the individual was deemed moral enough to earn one, and if the employees looked into a person’s purchase history and felt they had bought too much or exceeded government limits, they could arbitrarily refuse to sell them alcohol. It was quite difficult to get the law passed that would allow for the sale of alcohol in Ontario in the first place, and so the LCBO had to show it was taking its role as a “control” board seriously. However, its stringent temperance-inspired rules continued on to the 1970s when the sale of alcohol was commonplace and non-controversial.
The LCBO was, and is, a government monopoly on the sale of alcohol. This type of power allowed it to pick and choose who could work at the LCBO and who could purchase alcohol.
Women and people of colour were effectively not allowed to work at the LCBO in its early days, researcher Jamie Bradburn notes. Indigenous people in Ontario were not allowed to hold permits to purchase alcohol from the LCBO until 1959.
Named the “Indian list,” the LCBO maintained a list of people it deemed not responsible enough to purchase alcohol. This patronizing and racist policy was cemented through Ontarians having to apply for a Liquor Permit Book, which made citizens prove they were 21 years old, a resident of Ontario and of “good” character; this of course did not apply to Indigenous peoples.
It was up to LCBO employees to further decide if those who were of Indigenous and white background would be a good candidate for the ability to purchase alcohol. If they were not sure, the LCBO employee could reject their application because “ … a person of part-Indian blood, living in, say, an urban community, could be refused for such reason.”
Not only did it take until 1959 for Indigenous people to fully have the right to a permit to purchase alcohol from the LCBO, Bradburn wrote in his TVO feature, ”Buzzkillers: A brief history of the LCBO,” the corporation continued to view Indigenous people as a high-risk population after that time.
Those LCBO employees who did sell alcohol to Indigenous persons would be prosecuted under the Indian Act and the Liquor Control Act, according to the research paper “Administrative surveillance of alcohol consumption in Ontario, Canada: pre-electronic technologies of control” by Gary Genosko and Scott Thompson.
In addition to Indigenous persons, the LCBO was wary of those living in rural areas since they decided those might be places with heavy drinking.
The LCBO continues its legacy of self-proclaimed moral superiority, saying it is still proud of its ability to “embrace (its) obligation and opportunity to … govern the responsible sale of alcohol.” Despite recent advances in consumer choice in alcohol in Ontario, the LCBO still maintains a monopoly over the sale of spirits, and over wholesale alcohol in the province.
It is a mystery why Ontarians continue to put up with this system. The LCBO even has a page on “Honouring National Indigenous History Month,” with absolutely no mention of its own dark role in the history of Indigenous peoples.
Switching to a system that relies even less on the LCBO, or that eliminates the need for the LCBO, would be a positive change in Ontario. Although the LCBO generates revenue for the province, Ontario could instead be saving millions and even billions of dollars if the LCBO was simply the wholesaler, and not retailer, of alcohol.
Alongside these savings, Ontarians could also start seeing more of the alcohol they want on the shelves when LCBO employees stop being the only ones able to decide what to buy and inevitably sit on boxes of unused merchandise.
With the province of Ontario projecting a $6-billion deficit, it might do well to reconsider an archaic system once marred by racism, sexism and surveillance and which continues to run inefficiently and with a maintained sense of paternalism.
Originally published here
