Minimum Alcohol Pricing

It seems that the coalition government of the UK are proposing plans to introduce minimum prices for alcohol, to combat the binge drinking culture within the UK which is seemingly getting 'out of hand'. It has been described as "an important first step," by the Home Office Minister James Brokenshire. The alcohol companies, quite predictably, view it as a pragmatic solution, whilst Health campaigners see it as "not enough". The question of binge drinking is something that does need to be reduced to an extent as it obviously causes many problems in the UK, you only need to visit the streets of any major city on a Friday night to see this, but it is not quite clear as to how to solve it.


The result of a binge drinking culture is that many people resort to anti-social activities such as violence and verbal abuse, and this causes many issues in terms of safety on the streets at night among others. As well as this the NHS is affected because of the health issues caused by either the effects of anti-social behaviour or from alcohol related illness. Of course, the majority of drinkers in the UK do not regularly behave like this at all, most prefer to participate in sessions of moderate drinking which are highly entertaining and also very social and harmless, the big question is why is there this small portion of society which feels like they need to rush to the weekend and consume as much alcohol as possible.


The proposals do have their advantages, a minimum pricing might discourage people from buying cheap alcohol with the intention to get drunk to their hearts content, it may make people think again in a time of high unemployment to spend their money more wisely and it may set the precedent for future proposals which higher the price of alcohol even more and impose a more dynamic law and set to change the drinking culture in Britain forever.


However, I believe this not to be the case. I'm not siding with the alcohol companies here because I believe that their sole interests lie in profit and not the consumer, but I think that is does look like a pragmatic solution. The strategy of minimum pricing on the surface does seem very well, but if you scratch below the surface you realise that there is a much deeper problem with the drinking culture and some more thoughtful approaches need to be taken. The problem with the proposals are that they are just a temporary fix, people will still find loopholes and ways to become paralytic, the law will just mean that people just have to around it differently. It appears like a quick reaction to make things appear like they are a quick reaction to it rather than a thorough investigation which considered all the possibilities.


I realise that I've offered no alternatives to the proposal of the Government, but I do think it is a quite simplistic reaction to a very complicated issue. It is such a deep rooted issue, does alcohol have anything to do with it at all or is there a bigger problem which causes people to act out in such a way and alcohol is just an enabler of this. Should the Government get involved at all and let us do whatever we bloody well want to. We will see how this minimum pricing proposal fares but my personal prediction is that it'll have little to no consequences other than booze is just little bit more expensive.


Extra Links:


BBC


Stewart Lee on drinking - Politics Show 2009