Should cheap booze be banned?

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.telegraph....ing-doctors-warn.html

First it was cigarettes and tobacco, now it is alcohol, next is almost definitely going top be the very food that we eat.

Will the measure to stop supermarkets selling cheap booze do anything to cut the rate of drinking by our youngsters? Judging by the price they pay for their drinks in the clubs these days, I don't think so somehow.

/// Diane Abbott, shadow public health minister, also added to the calls for tougher measures, claiming "alcohol has been too cheap for too long". ///

Maybe it has on her salary, and taking into account the subsidy on drink, enjoyed in the Houses of Parliament bar.

But not to the pensioner or the hard working couples who enjoy a drink after a hard days work.

[emmie]

if you are an out and out alcoholic and i have known some, then you will buy and drink anything, and often to the exclusion of food, it's why you rarely see a fat alcoholic, and what does them in the end, is usually the cigs that go along with the nasty stuff like white lightening, or special brew, as the arteries by that stage are ready to go bye bye.

[tamborine]

Em, drunks can sober up but pill addiction aint easy to stop.

[cazzz1975]

sober up in time for another drink..

[tamborine]

speak for yerself cazz

[cazzz1975]

I dont drink tambo, but I grew up around alcoholism, the urge to drink is as powerful as any other addiction

[lozzer50]

no! why should we have to pay more because some cant control their drinking. there are some bloody numptys in power i work damned hard and don't see why i should have to pay more. people will buy whatever the price.

[emmie]

alcoholics never sober up, not the ones i got to know, most very nice people, they just couldn't do without the stuff, morning, noon and night.

[ichkeria]

"But I still maintain that if they are determined, those who intend to get drunk will do it even if the price is raised. They find the money somehow, just as smokers do however much the tax is increased. "

Of course they will Bambiagain, but I don't think that is the only issue really. Like I said earlier, there's a difference between the problems of hopeless alcoholics and the problem of people of limited means (and indeed not so limited means) being encouraged to drink more because they can buy more for less or the same amount of money.
In the same way the comparison with Russia's vodka-crazies is also inappropriate (Yeltsin, now there's a leader who ruled by example lol)

[welshlibranr]

here here anotheoldgit!......they don't live in the real world!.........

[DaisyNonna]

You forgot to ban sex. Usually free but a cause of many problems. What is the going rate by the way?

[Khandro]

It depends Daisy; are you buying or selling?

[Halifaxmum]

yes! alcohol should be taxed to the hilt, so that it's only the middle and upper classes that can afford to become alcoholics...!

that way, the working classes can pay for our treatment on the NHS

Happy Days :)

[anotheoldgit]

If the government are all that concerned about our health why don't they ration alcohol?

They could issue us all with ration books and when one had bought their quota that would be it.

Or if they didn't want to go to that extreme measure, clubs and pubs could issue a card, which had to be stamped every time one purchased a drink, when one had a fully stamped card then time would be called for that individual,

These measures have not been fully thought out, but I think you get the idea.

[ichkeria]

It isn't the government, it's the medical profession that is primarily concerned. Odd, really, that they should be but there you have it :

[pa___ul3]

if that happened AOG, I'd become tee-total and sell off my allowance to the highest bidder!
It's fair to say we should be left to make our own decisions, nobody wants to be in a nanny state, but I don't see a problem in taxing those who make the wrong decisions that will eventually have a detrimental affect on those who don't. A 'health tax' on the likes of alcohol, cigarettes and crap food that went straight into the NHS coffers would be my ideal outcome.

[pa___ul3]

to be fair, we should be more concerned with our own health than the government are. At an individual level, if we're not looking after ourselves, why should anyone else be bothered? The government are bothered about how much our bad habits cost the nation, that's their role.

[anotheoldgit]

Pa___ul3

/// The government are bothered about how much our bad habits cost the nation, that's their role. ///

Exactly, my reference to the Government being concerned about our health, was just me being sarcastic.

[ichkeria]

If the government did nothing about the adverse affects of cheaper alcohol, consequent rising crime etc etc, the chorus of people clamouring for the government to "do something" would be deafening.

[pa___ul3]

aye that was more of a reference to WOTW.
If anything were to help wipe out the 'poor me, poor me, pour me a drink' attitude I'm all for it!