little al
Crystal Palace fan
Is it even possible to drink 3 bottles of vodka a day, and sustain that amount? I would be dead in a month, and I love a drink.
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Minimum alcohol pricing
- Thread starter bha100
- Start date
LATEST NEWS.........The government have done another U Turn and dropped the idea
Well that's great news for hospitals and police stations on a Friday and Saturday night then.
This has to be the government's biggest mistake since they were in power. I don't drink but sometimes go out on Friday and Saturday nights and see people behaving like complete twats after a few too many sherbets. This was a chance for David Cameron to send out a strong message that alcohol kills and is a blight on Britain but completely lost his nerve on this one.
Spineless fool.
Meade's Ball
Well-known member
Tescos have their inappropriate Everyday range, don't they, for bargain products. Every time i happen to pass the booze section and see a shelf of Everyday Gin, i think it's a little wrong.
Yesterday, in Tescos, they had a sign up in the frozen section about how they've recognised the need to not line sausages with pigeon scrotums and tell us, the customer, exactly what is inside each of their products. It said in big letters BECAUSE WE LISTEN. I crossed out the listen and scribbled on GOT CAUGHT and today it was no longer there. I mostly wrote that because they'd put that sign on top of the meatfree freezer and it seemed just stupid to tell me, a vegetarian of their slaughterhouse failings. If, however, in the quorn chicken burgers they'd actually been using quorn bat extract without me knowing, i'd be incensed, and demand that sign back.
happypig
Staring at the rude boys
The trouble with minimum pricing is that it isn't a "silver bullet" that will cure all problems because there are a whole raft of problems associated with alcohol; health, public order, crime etc.
We need to look at why a significant number of ordinary people drink a lot at home, we need to look at how we deal with street drinkers, we need to consider if the current way of dealing with anti-social behaviour is working (a lot of ASB is alcohol related).
We have developed, over a few centuries into a drinking culture and to suggest that making supermarkets charge more for booze is going to make all the problems go away is very simplistic.
My solution, and I know it wouldn't find favour with many is that only pubs are allowed to sell alcohol, for drinking there and for take away. I'd also couple it with a far more robust approach to selling drink to people who are already pissed; in the last few years I've seen countless people charged with offences committed when drunk but I've only seen one publican in the dock and that was for allowing a 17yo to buy a drink.
We need to look at why a significant number of ordinary people drink a lot at home, we need to look at how we deal with street drinkers, we need to consider if the current way of dealing with anti-social behaviour is working (a lot of ASB is alcohol related).
We have developed, over a few centuries into a drinking culture and to suggest that making supermarkets charge more for booze is going to make all the problems go away is very simplistic.
My solution, and I know it wouldn't find favour with many is that only pubs are allowed to sell alcohol, for drinking there and for take away. I'd also couple it with a far more robust approach to selling drink to people who are already pissed; in the last few years I've seen countless people charged with offences committed when drunk but I've only seen one publican in the dock and that was for allowing a 17yo to buy a drink.
Benson
Member
Sorry Edna, No they wouldn't. An alcoholic would rarely buy that product. No hit, No use. One pound? Mmm, source the strong cider! It's not about the buying of it, it's about the consumption of the drug. He wouldn't have gone to Halfords for his fix, (meths has a better track record for relief, so B&Q maybe?) Anything he could get his hands on.
If the minimum price does rise then alchoholics of the minute would just drink the next cheapest thing.
Me, how do i know? 60+ units per day, every day. Detox. Dry for 14 weeks (****, **** ****!). Gave in.
It has to be a slow change in drinking culture which wont be felt for decades. It needs doing though.
Remember when the sunday drinking culture was much derided by some? i'm not sure that the answer of 'cafe culture' and allday drinking was really the right idea in hindsight.
Soz, i'm ranting, and as a desperate lush (receiving help), I would buy any kind of drink regardless of the price.
TheBigUnit
Active member
Where indeed, does he shop...
beorhthelm
A. Virgo, Football Genius
- Jul 21, 2003
- 35,322
maybe you missed the 2% on the can?
someone today pointed out there is already minimum pricing - excise duty. its based on the alcohol content. works out about 55p on a 5% pint.
clapham_gull
Legacy Fan
- Aug 20, 2003
- 25,347
Don't think it will affect anything, but it's incredibly easy to get hammered these days for next to nothing.
I bought a couple of those pure mixed Whisky and Ginger things from M and S a while back for a change. A couple of those and I was quite merry.
But it did make me think- they are under £3 quid.
No wonder so many young adults are "pre loading" these days. I see it all the time in London and I'm sure you do in Brighton. Youngsters sh** faced before they go out to save money.
Problem is out in the club when you are already drunk, you probably care less about the money and have a few too many drinks.
So (and here is the controversial bit) I think its the expensive alcohol in pubs and clubs that has created the market and demand for cheap alcohol.
I don't blame the trade, it's the high taxation of alcohol that has paradoxically prompted the big supermarkets to sell it at cost or below.
Bought a few bottles of one of favourite win at ASDA at Christmas. They must have been making a loss or no profit at all.
Controversially again, I don't think any supermarket in a dominant market position should be allowed to sell anything at a loss.
Saves us money ? Rubbish. They are just getting the money back ripping us off in other areas. The price of veg is shocking in supermarkets.
As I get off my high horse, I shop in them all the time and am lucky to have all the big ones within walking distance. Gives me the ability to go to Tesco for instance and get a large rump joint at half price and avoid their veg which is cheaper in Sainsburys. I also shop a lot in ALDI because I'm lucky enough to have two in the area.
I bought a couple of those pure mixed Whisky and Ginger things from M and S a while back for a change. A couple of those and I was quite merry.
But it did make me think- they are under £3 quid.
No wonder so many young adults are "pre loading" these days. I see it all the time in London and I'm sure you do in Brighton. Youngsters sh** faced before they go out to save money.
Problem is out in the club when you are already drunk, you probably care less about the money and have a few too many drinks.
So (and here is the controversial bit) I think its the expensive alcohol in pubs and clubs that has created the market and demand for cheap alcohol.
I don't blame the trade, it's the high taxation of alcohol that has paradoxically prompted the big supermarkets to sell it at cost or below.
Bought a few bottles of one of favourite win at ASDA at Christmas. They must have been making a loss or no profit at all.
Controversially again, I don't think any supermarket in a dominant market position should be allowed to sell anything at a loss.
Saves us money ? Rubbish. They are just getting the money back ripping us off in other areas. The price of veg is shocking in supermarkets.
As I get off my high horse, I shop in them all the time and am lucky to have all the big ones within walking distance. Gives me the ability to go to Tesco for instance and get a large rump joint at half price and avoid their veg which is cheaper in Sainsburys. I also shop a lot in ALDI because I'm lucky enough to have two in the area.
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You're spot on.
As a student, 'pre-drinking' is the norm in order to save a bit of cash. If I buy 6 cans of fosters, it costs me £5 in my local off license, whereas 6 pints would cost me near enough twenty quid. However in my case it's often not just about the cost. I can go out here and get dirt cheap (80p) drinks some nights of the week, but its the idea of standing in a queue for 10 or 15 minutes that puts me off. Sometimes it is just about having a few drinks with some mates before going out, it's hard to have a proper conversation whilst in a nightclub with a few hundred others.
I do agree that it wouldn't change anything though. Students drink A LOT, but I can't see another 20 pence or so on standard lagers changing anything. The only people that really buy the sort of stuff aforementioned, like the Tesco value Beers, the White lightning and so on, are the full blown alcoholics. When somebodies addicted to a substance that bad, I dont think a small increase in price will curbe their consumption, it'll simply bring in more revenue for the government.
Screenwash sounds like a student cocktail.
This minimum price thing is one of the most absurd and illogical government ideas I have ever heard. It will not control alcohol intake any more than ever increasing tax on fags controls smoking or outlawing drugs stops people rolling a spliff. It's a lazy token effort at best and a cynical new revenue stream at worst.
RowleyBirkinQ.C(deceased)
New member
Exactomondo
Well that's great news for hospitals and police stations on a Friday and Saturday night then.
This was a chance for David Cameron to send out a strong message that alcohol kills and is a blight on Britain but completely lost his nerve on this one.
Spineless fool.
You dont day ... !!!
Well I do and I too sometimes go out on a Friday night, usually consume more units that some transient body has designated that is good for me.
Just like the vast majority of like minded people and I laugh till my sides split, bond with friends and colleagues reaffirm friendships and then toddle home without disrespecting the police, without log jamming the A&E department.
I do not know if you are a 'sick quitter' when it comes to alcohol, but you have a very narrow minded view of the responsible drinker, if in fact you recognise any responsible consumer of alcohol is valid.
So you just as this body of doctors should not impact on my life choices, give me the facts and allow us educated, sensible adults to make a considered judgement, without imposed sanctions.
Titus
Come on!
But it would help, just as people have cut down on smoking because they can't afford it.
I'm not convinced. As with most things I prefer to educate rather than legislate i.e. allow people to make informed decisions and have a program to help those who have problems. I appreciate this is very theoretical and it will take a huge huge cultural change, not to mention a few generations, to reduce the current situation but the UK has to start somewhere. Jacking up the prices is not really addressing the root cause is it?
I'm really struggling to reconcile this response with Durston's post. Do you think you have been a bit OTT?
I disagree - the hike in cigarette prices has only stopped light and casual smokers. Heavy smokers still smoke. The same will probably happen if they increase the price of alcohol. Those that they really want to cut down will just sacrifice other things such as food to buy the more expensive drink. As usual the only solution our inept politicians can come up with is either taxation or banning - neither work yet idiots in Whitehall persist.
Bevendean Hillbilly
New member
Your inspectors need a good talking to...or is it that the coffee in the canteen has got really bad since the cuts?
It's not a tax. The government wouldn't get a penny from it.
I'm not sure it would have effected the group out on a Friday/Saturday, as any drink bought in a pub etc wouldn't be effected - it's only cheap drinks in the supermarket that would be effected.Well that's great news for hospitals and police stations on a Friday and Saturday night then.
Of course it wouldn't cure all problems. It wouldn't even cure most problems. But if it cured some problems, that would be a good thing.
But what about those that are already buying the cheapest thing - could it reduce the amount they drink? And this idea wasn't solely to help alcoholics, it was to reduce the amount that young people (with small amounts of money) binge drink.
Ouch. Good luck.
But increasing the price of cigarettes has reduced the amount that people smoke - it has worked. And it's not a new revenue stream is it, because it's not a tax. Not that you'd care about the facts, you just want to bash anything the tory's do (fun for a bit, but it gets boring quickly).
Of course you're right there, education is better, but education isn't enough on it's own. Cigarettes are the best example - everyone knows smoking is bad for you (while small amounts of alcohol are not bad for you), but people still do it. Education will not stop them, and price increases will not stop all of them, but it has helped.