Boozy Britain – the debate continues…
Posted on 02. Jun, 2010 by Handbaglady in Communications, News
In keeping with our national obsession with booze….most of the papers, including The Times, Independent, Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail and Daily Mirror reported today on NICE launching new guidance on preventing harmful binge drinking. NICE said alcohol must become less affordable and harder to obtain.
The guidance does not recommend a minimum price but assessed the impact of a rise to 50p per unit. Professor Mike Kelly, NICE’s public health director said studies showed that this price rise would cut consumption among moderate drinkers by 3.8 per cent and by 10.3 per cent in those drinking at hazardous levels. NICE believes this is the most effective way to tackle binge drinking and its impact on NHS and society.
But Health Secretary Andrew Lansley has rejected the body’s analysis and said ministers instead favoured banning supermarkets and off-licences from selling alcohol “below cost price”.
Asked why NICE rejected a ban on “below cost” promotions in favour of a minimum price, Anne Ludbrooke, professor of health economics at the University of Aberdeen and a member of the panel that drew up the guidance, said: “What does ‘below cost’ mean? We need a definition. Some alcohol could remain quite cheap under that definition.”
Professor Ian Gilmore, president of the Royal College of Physicians, who has backed a minimum price, said “below cost” was a confusing term capable of a variety of interpretations. “If it is just the duty plus the VAT, not including manufacturing, marketing and distribution costs, it is a very low base.”
Clearly guidance and clarification is needed on the problematic term “below cost” and an agreement reached in order to tackle this ongoing issue.
In the meantime many of the big supermarkets have very enticing world cup ‘deals’ in particular on beer and lager. Something tells me that over the next few weeks there will be a huge amount of ‘below cost’ booze sunk in pubs and homes across the country and not many people will be complaining…!
neilcrump
03. Jun, 2010
The stats that you quoted in relation to a 50p price rise are interesting: “…cut consumption among moderate drinkers by 3.8 per cent and by 10.3 per cent in those drinking at hazardous levels.” So actually price is a really blunt instrument in control of alcohol consumption. The topic got a lot of coverage but I’m not sure that anything has got to the heart of the matter that culturally we Brits have a strange (and highly abusive) relationship with booze. This type of behaviour that many learn in their teens is a really tough one to change.
NW1er
03. Jun, 2010
Would legalisation of other narcotics increase or decrease alcohol consumption? Discuss