The smokers are now well hammered, is it the turn of the drinkers?

[youngmafbog]

http://news.sky.com/story/1017470/cheap-booze-ministers-to-reveal-curb-plans

I really cant see how this works.

1) It clobbers the poor
2) The late teen, early twenty drinkers have plenty of excess income a few pence will make little difference. And most pubs/nightclubs are well above it anyway so it wont clear up the streets
3) People will start to make their own which will be stronger and unregulated. (so bang goes your health theory)
4) Smuggling back again ? - just as with fags.
5) And is a time of austerity a good time?
6) Why can't we use the laws we have at the moment. Sell to underage - loose licence, sell to drunks - loose licence. That is how to stop it.

I'm sure there are many more reasons. Cameron seems hell bent on p*ssing off the electorate, clearly he does not want to be re-elected, it is the nanny state more than labour these days, I'm sure he is a clone of Blair.

And most importantly, will the minumum price be applied in the commons bar?

[emmie]

keyplus, the church, religion has a tendency to rob us of many things, let's get some perspective here.

[ichkeria]

But if beer is £4 a pint that is already well above the new limit so won't be affected.

I think supermarkets ARE limited to when they sell alcohol, aren't they? I'm sure I've been in Tesco at odd hours and noticed the wine/beer section closed off

It's one thing considering the behaviour of people when drunk, which definitely seems to differ depending which country you go to, and another thing entirely considering the health effects of drinking large amounts. I might be loud, anti-social and obnoxious after 4 pints or so drunk quickly with friends with whom I feel relaxed and want to impress. On the other hand I might be the sort of person who drinks 4 bottles of cheap wine a day but never says a word. The chances are the second scenario is more damaging to my health.

[ummmm]

It won't affect pub prices.

[ludwig]

It won't affect much at the moment but it's establishing a principle that there is a minimum price set by the government.

Once it's in place successive governments will keep cranking it up year on year, like tax on tobacco.

..shortly followed by the 'fat tax' on pizzas etc.

[emmie]

a guy on a tv programme, forget which one, suggested that all supermarkets be banned from selling alcohol and that pub chains should be encouraged to sell cheaper beer, alcohol, as a way of keeping alive at least a vestige of community, which has been eroded over the last number of years. Once pubs, and the church were central to most people, now the church is heading the way of the dodo, perhaps something could be done about our ever decreasing pubs.
You once had off licenses attached to pubs where you get could your cans, or wine, and soft drinks, so why not reinstate them.

[emmie]

i have known any number of alcoholics, they were not social drinkers, but addicts, and you can't bargain for that, nor can you do much if the person is hell bent on a pretty awful method of self destruction. Those people do not pay 4 quid a pint, but 2 quid for something so strong that would wipe most people out in a nanosecond. I hasten to add that at least 6 of those people are now dead.

[Old_Geezer]

It may actually encourage bulk buying as whatever price it goes up to it will be less than in the pubs & clubs, so it encourages downing even more than now prior to arriving there, to save overall.

Different behaviour/habits in different coutries is a culture thing. I don't think price will have a great affect on that.

[whiskeryron]

The answer I believe does not lie in banning or pricing alcohol off the market but surely concentrating on those that abuse it, take them off the streets & literally throw them into the lockup without nanny state ''what about their rights'' attitudes interfering. I firmly believe that in a civilized society those that do not behave in a civilized manner must be subjected to correction & taught to behave. I am sure that after a while the ''naughty'' ones will not want the treatment repeated.

WR.

[LazyGun]

"Different behaviour/habits in different coutries is a culture thing. I don't think price will have a great affect on that."

Up to a point, OG - The ever-increasing price of a tobacco has probably been the most significant single driver in changing public attitudes toward smoking. That, coupled with the social engineering of the implementation of smoking bans in pubs, clubs, restaurants etc has effected a significant drop in the number of smokers, and a marked change in social attitudes toward smoking.

Raising the unit price of alcohol will have no impact on pub and club prices, which already charge a lot more than that, so introducing such a tariff is unlikely to effect your average punter heading down the pub for a pint.

There is an undeniable public health problem of alcohol abuse in this country, especially amongst the young - one very new and disturbing measure of the seriousness of this problem is the huge rise in the need for liver transplants in young recipients, where the morbid damage to their own liver has been identified as being due to excessive alcohol consumption.

Other measures of the scale of the problem include the ever- upward trend of A/E treatments for alcohol -related injuries, especially evident on Fridays and Saturdays, as well as the contribution towards obesity and diabetes 2 that excessive alcohol consumption makes etc.

Such actions all come with a huge human and social cost, and something does need to be done - I would have some doubts as to the effectiveness of a minimum tariff though.

[jno]

surely the idea is to make bulk buying more expensive, rather than the price of an individual pint at the pub? (Though it might discourage happy hours).

In other words, to discourage binge drinking because all at once you've got 150 cans for tuppence each from Morrson's.

Whether it will actually work I have no idea.

[anotheoldgit]

Already posted on the subject

http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/News/Question1191501.html

[keyplus90]

It is good if the price rises as high as it is possible. Because that would make me feel good about saving all that money.

[emmie]

keyplus
so you don't mind putting all the people who work in the industry, not just pubs go to the wall, very sound comment i must say.
and everytime the government adds a little extra alcohol tax to the treasury the pubs simply put up their prices a bit more, it's why it's 4 quid or in some cases more a pint. It's driving pubs to close at a massive rate, and for that reason i am more than sorry.

[ummmm]

£2.50 a pint at my uncles pub :-)

[naomi24]

Keyplus, //It is good if the price rises as high as it is possible. Because that would make me feel good about saving all that money. //

What on earth are you talking about? You don't spend any money on alcohol. You don't drink alcohol.

[ichkeria]

I don't think pubs are closing due to the high price of alcohol, are they?
And we all know what happens when pubs promote cheap drinks for an hour or longer ...

The general idea is that if stuff in more expensive less of it will be bought and if less alcohol is bought less will be drunk and if less alcohol is drunk less damage will be done to people's health. The only proof of whether it will have worked will come a few years from now if stats show that the desired effect has happened.
I had to smile at the bloke on the TV the other day, arguing passionately if rather badly, against the proposals:
"I just can't see how this is a vote-winner" (!)

Anyway, it looks as though the large brewing and distilling concerns, those (unelected) guardians of the well-being of us all and of right of the poor to drink themselves to an early grave, will stop it in its tracks or do their best to.

[emmie]

It is one of the reasons that pubs are closing, and the only chain can think of who sell cheaper beer is Weatherspoons, and most are dire. if punters pay 4 quid a pint they won't be hanging around too long for the second, third, unless it's a party. Buying rounds of drinks turns very costly.
The chains have been killing pubs for a long time, high cost to the people who own, run pubs, the smoking ban too has played it's part. And in the capital like it or not large scale immigration has played it's part, those who don't drink, don't need a local pub.

[ludwig]

naomi // What on earth are you talking about? You don't spend any money on alcohol. You don't drink alcohol //

I think what he's saying is 'At the moment I save £500 a year by not buying any alcohol. It'll be good when they put the price up because then I'll be saving even more'.

It's like that old joke -
'This morning I ran to work behind the bus and saved £2.50'
'Really? You should have run behind a taxi and saved yourself £20'.

[naomi24]

Ludwig, ahh, clever! Now I know. ;o)