Ontario won't impose hard cap on beer sold in grocery stores

Finance Minister Charles Sousa says the government will not impose "stringent restrictions'' on the amount of beer that Ontario grocery stores will be able to sell.

Sousa says the final plans for the modernizing of beer sales in the province should be ready within weeks and will increase the amount of availability.

The government intends to allow sales of six-packs of beer in up to 450 grocery stores across Ontario by 2018.

The premier's advisory panel on government assets recommended licences restrict beer sales at each grocery tore to about $1 million a year, and chains would be able to average the volume sold across all its licensed outlets.

Sousa says it would be up to the grocers who win the licences to decide where to sell the beer, saying the government won't restrict them in terms of store locations.

He says there will be sufficient and ample amount of availability for consumers when the expanded sales in grocery stores becomes a reality, and stores won't have to worry about hitting a quota wall.

"There won't be stringent restrictions that's going to prevent those respective licensees from having the amounts that are required,'' he said. "They'll be okay.''