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With the ongoing discussions about unit pricing of alcohol I wonder if the 650 wasters who are thinking of foisting this carp on sensible drinkers in the UK are going to go for realistic prices in the bars at their place of work? How many of us even have a bar at their place of work? Please discuss!
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It's easier for them to take a sledgehammer to crack a nut than actually address the problem.
Pat
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I disagree with minimum pricing, it unfairly penalises the vast majority and doesn't help those who need it.
If you are hooked you will pay, homeless drunks beg, not to buy food, clothes or a bed for the night but for a drink. Therefore taxing those that drink a lot though do have a couple of pennies to tub together will may reduce the standard of living of their families though wont stop them drinking.
Addiction needs a different approach.
And will it reduce drinking by those who spend a small % of their income on drink? No! And guys who drink in pubs etc pay well above the minimum pricing as it is.
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"It's easier for them to take a sledgehammer to crack a nut than actually address the problem."
But alcohol abuse is a huge problem in the UK and its costing us millions. What practical measures would you take to reduce the problems or do you think things should be left as they are?
Evidence from Canada suggest that minimum price legislation is effective. Of course its not a total answer but it does seem to work to a degree
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They have some predictions about how many lives will be saved, but frankly the numbers are so small they will be lost in the roundings - and they probably don't take account of the street drinkers who will die sooner because they will be even poorer (a proper alcoholic doesn't cut down on drink when it goes up, he cuts something else).
It certainly won't have any effect on the young drunks falling around our town centres at the weekend.
It might even excacerbate the problems with other drugs - alcohol is at least regulated - making it less available will at some point result in alternatives becoming more popular.
It won't affect me much if at all, but it's bound to have unforeseen consequences somewhere and no doubt it will also need some new quango to run it. As if there isn't enough to worry about - fiddling while the country goes down the plughole.
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When I was a 7/8 yrs old I would be sent by my grandpa for a bottle of whisky from his friend's shop round the corner.............it was roughly £1 7/6d = £1.37p.
Average wage was about £8-£10 per week - so you could buy a bottle of spirits but it was in the region of a day's pay.
2011 - a bottle is £11 upwards - under 2 hrs on the minimum wage.............
It might be a factor amongst other things.
I dropped a few bottles over the years but as he got £20 / £30 week from his business he could afford it. Both he and his son died with alcohol being part of the reason - he was 84 but my uncle was in his 50s.
I drink very little - less than say £200 / year.
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The issue is the supermarkets selling beer at 20p per unit. I don't think any minimum pricing will effect bars and pubs.
It could actually benefit them, if supermarket beer prices are similar to pub prices then people might start returning to pubs rather than getting hammered at home until pollute the sewage system.
I drink a lot when I go out but I know when to stop, sometimes that is two hours before I leave the venue. That way by the time I leave I am sober enough have to my wits about me and in the morning I have nothing more than a head ache.
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Let the jocks try it out first.
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Solve the problem?
Easy. NHS refuses to treat those with alcohol issues unless they pay. in full for their treatment.
If they can afford to drink, they can afford to pay.
After a few thousand deaths, the world will be a better place. Breed alcohol resistant humans.
:-)
Last edited by: madf on Sat 31 Dec 11 at 11:42
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I don't know the maths involved, but I would imagine after paying the £10,000s of in tax such alcohol abuse would cost they have already paid for the treatment.
It is simply unfair to treat all people with alcohol related illnesses like that.
What I am getting at is what is the total cost of alcohol related diseases to the NHS v the total income the taxman gets from alcohol sales?
Last edited by: RattleandSmoke on Sat 31 Dec 11 at 12:06
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If the offering of alcohol for public consumption were to have only recently been invented it would almost certainly not be permitted or legalised. It's only because of long term custom and practice that it remains acceptable in our society. I'm not anti-alcohol by the way, I drink it myself although quite sparingly these days.
Certain cultures seem to cope with it better than others. Most British town centres are disgusting and unpleasant places at certain times directly as a result of the abuse of alcohol. I travel to and work in Italy a lot. Alcohol, particularly in the form of wine is integral to their social culture but you very seldom see anyone outrageously drunk. There is clearly something hard-wired into the British ( and indeed certain other societies to be fair ) which causes over-indulgence to be the favoured practice.
I wonder why?
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>> I wonder why?
It has always been the case. The Hogarth prints Beer Street and Gin Lane en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Beer-street-and-Gin-lane.jpg
are just but one example of the history of binge drinking and alcohol abuse by the Brits over hundred of years. You have to remember that licensing hours were brought in because the workers were too drunk or absent to produce armaments during the great war.
Northern Europeans are worse than their Southern counterparts, and its much more an Urban problem.
Its social upbringing. Italians (and the French) introduce the use of alcohol and a social family circle to their kids at a youngish age.
I have tried to do the same here, laddo was allowed to drink wine and shandy, in moderation, with meals long before the legal age. (about 8 or 9 I think). On the whole its worked, he has a very sensible attitude to drinking. (We had one blip, he was doing some pocket money labouring and the builders spilled his puke covered remains out of a taxi onto the pavement outside our house one night - Its never happened since, never even seen him slightly squiffy)
Last edited by: Zero on Sat 31 Dec 11 at 12:35
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The Hogarth prints were a celebration of moderate beer drinking compared to the blind drunkenness of those who drank spirits.
www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/pd/w/william_hogarth,_beer_street.aspx
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I've noticed the drink problem in smaller towns more. I've never once witnessed the scenes you see on TV with out of control youths being sick in the streets and flashing etc in Manchester or London.
That said I am sure if I went to places like the Print Works I would, I just avoid anything to with chav culture and the places they drink.
Tonight will be a nightmare as I suspect it will be full of people who rarely go out and cannot handle their drink.
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>> The Hogarth prints were a celebration of moderate beer drinking compared to the blind drunkenness
>> of those who drank spirits.
Beer Street celebrates the virtues of the mildly intoxicating traditional national drink. Beer inspires artists and refreshes tradesmen and labourers. It can be drunk safely on rooftops
yeah right. Yes I know the beer and ales sold in those times had less alcohol content.
In reality it was just an excuse for Hogarth to portray the terrible underclass in tragic and comic tones for the amusement of his rich and upper class patrons. Who were also probably legless, but tolerated because they were upper class.
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>> In reality it was just an excuse for Hogarth to portray the terrible underclass in
>> tragic and comic tones for the amusement of his rich and upper class patrons. Who
>> were also probably legless, but tolerated because they were upper class.
>>
The lower classes drank and dies young - cold/poor food, disease.
The upper classes drank and were old enough to suffer from gout.
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I can't remember the exact figures but it was shocking, in East Manchester the life expectancy of a male was around 60, where as in Didsbury just 5 miles down the road it was 81. However most cities would be the same.
I life in a higher life expectancy part of Manchester, but my diet is in between, I don't live of lentils like a lot of my neighbours, but at the same time I don't eat fried food every day.
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Drink has its social uses. Troops were given enough Dutch courage to keep them facing forward in battle until quite recently. Perhaps they still are.
A novel I translated some years ago now, which seemed historically well-founded in a number of ways, underlined the role of alcohol in the escalating events leading to the savage repression of the Paris Commune in 1871.
The officially or semi-officially sponsored right-wing mobs which are sometimes used in the US to break up irksome lefty demonstrations are very often completely ratted.
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A man hath no better thing under the sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry.
Ecclesiastes 8.15
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Thought you was a pagan Dog
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I'm not really what you would call a heavy drinker, I can often go for hours without touching a drop.
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>> I have tried to do the same here, laddo was allowed to drink wine and
>> shandy, in moderation, with meals long before the legal age. (about 8 or 9 I
>> think). On the whole its worked, he has a very sensible attitude to drinking. (We
>> had one blip, he was doing some pocket money labouring and the builders spilled his
>> puke covered remains out of a taxi onto the pavement outside our house one night
>> - Its never happened since, never even seen him slightly squiffy)
>>
I think everyone has / should have a blip. I remember being about 17 and having more than a few ciders, and ending up in a sorry state. Couldn't even stand the smell of it for years afterwards
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Out tonight hope it's cheap but know it's not £3.25 a pint of lager Weatherspoons cheaper but not much £2.60 a pint can't beat old mans club £2.10 a pint for lager.
Bring on more cheap beer and women!!
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Minumum price for pies, sausages and chocolate cos they make you fat ... tis the same thing ...
... it should be down to lifestyle education and support not legislation.
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Out tonight at a neighbours for a party - in Scotland they have outlawed multi buy deals so, instead, supermarkets are just charging a smaller price.
It has slightly worked for me in that a typical case is now £7, previously it might have been 3 for £18 and I would have taken the 3 even though I only needed one. At £7 I will now only take 1 so theoretically if there comes a time that I have finished that case and haven't been back for another, then until I do, I will be drinking less due to these new rules.
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Surely the answer is to keep cut-price alcohol but allow economic decline to reach a point at which the 'vulnerable groups' can't even afford cheapo stuff?
Eureka! Miss Goebbels, take a letter to the PM, cc to the Chancellor please...
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I used to smoke cigarettes.
When my employer banned smoking in the office, I smoked a lot less during the working day.
Newspaper offices are knee deep in old newspapers and other bits of paper, so allowing smoking was dangerous anyway.
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Unless your sensible tipple involves drinking varnish I doubt many here will notice the minimum pricing.
It's planned to prevent 2 litre bottles of 8% cider being sold for £1.49, but will have little impact on those drinking bottles of ale that cost £1, spirits that cost £10/bottle, or wine that £4 a bottle.
If you're that desperate to get pi@@ed for less brew yer own.
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It's the response of a fascist, statist government.
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>> the response of a fascist, statist government.
Not nearly as fascist as my solution (see above). I thought you would approve Roger.
(Only kidding)
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>>It's the response of a fascist, statist government.
I guess you'll be against countries having armed services and police forces then.
The ultimate symbol of Statism.
Last edited by: Lygonos on Sun 1 Jan 12 at 12:32
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Unless I misunderstood the proposed legislation, the idea was that shops would be unable to sell alcohol at a price below a certain amount per unit - it's not a new tax.
The idea is to stop both easy access to white cider (basically industrial grade alcohol with flavourings that used to be related to apples), and to stop alcohol being promoted and subsidised by the non-alcoholic parts of your shopping.
If the useful side-effect of less alcohol-related social problems (ill health, domestic violence, absenteeism/sickness/invalidity, anti-social behaviour,etc) come to fruition then that's an added benefit.
In England I think the level suggested for the minimum price was basically duty+VAT which is a bit lower than the 40-45p region the SNP were pushing for.
On paper seems a better plan than simply increasing duties which encourages smuggling/counterfeiting of the more expensive brands (which will be unaffected by the minimum-price-per-unit).
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I believe in Ontario where they have minimum price legislation, it applies to alcohol over 5.50%/ A minimum price per unit of alcohol is set thus driving up the the price of cheap high alcohol beers and ciders designed specifically for heavy drinkers and alcoholics.
There is little or no effect in the price of alcoholic products for the average consumer.
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It is no part of a Government's remit to tell retailers the price they must charge for their merchandise.
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Welcome to democracy (a.k.a choose your own dictatorship).
Tehy could simply choose to increase duty to do the same - this would impact on everyone who drinks alcohol.
And lead to increased smuggling/counterfeiting.
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While not necessarily advocating it as an economic strategy, retail price fixing does have some advantages as well as downsides. I think it was Germany who for many years after WW2 and up until the early '90s I seem to think, had just such an arrangement on all consumer goods. Recomended retail prices were set by manufacturers and retailers were obliged to charge the same price nationwide for those goods. In the main, they were set at a fair level which allowed them be be affordable by the purchaser while ensuring an opportunity for profit at all the critical points in the supply chain. The side-effect of all this was that in order to gain market share, the retailers could only compete on the quality of their service levels rather than price. Like it or not, it sort of worked. Discounting of slow-moving lines was only allowed at set times, in the case of non-perishables that was restricted to two short "sale" periods twice a year.
The upshot of all this was that the retail and manufacturing sub-economies remained at least stable and in fact in many cases grew and consumer pricing was transparent. Product quality became a much greater factor in its consumer attractiveness and service levels became second to none.
Our modern obsession with price as the key measure of attractiveness leads only to a dimunition of quality, longer range off-shore sourcing and the almost inevitable collapse of domestic manufacturing.
We should be more careful what we wish for. It comes with its own price.
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Cheap Alcohol - Pat
