Scots to bring in minimum price booze
Discussion
handpaper said:
Lord Marylebone said:
On average, enough alcohol is sold to enable every single Scot over the age of 18 to consume 44% more alcohol than the recommended limit every single week..
Is that the old recommended limit that was pulled out of thin air, or the new recommended limit based on furious lobbying by an ancient temperance movement?Not saying there isn't a problem (for some), but I wouldn't lean too heavily on such stats.
But it's hard to argue with the other statistics, which are quite shocking.
Lord Marylebone said:
The Surveyor said:
Lord Marylebone said:
I suppose the big question is:
Why do the Scottish have such a problem with alcohol?
They don't. The Office for national Statistics survey of Alcohol use confirmed:- Why do the Scottish have such a problem with alcohol?
"•In 2016, similar patterns of drinking were observed in England, Scotland and Wales; of the English regions, binge drinking was more common in the north"
Given the health problems associated with heavy drinking, it's sensible to try and impose a control on the worse drinkers so you can't knock Scotland for trying whether you think minimum pricing is the answer or not.
Some facts:
24 people in Scotland die of alcohol related issues per week - 54% more than England and Wales.
On average, enough alcohol is sold to enable every single Scot over the age of 18 to consume 44% more alcohol than the recommended limit every single week.
Alcohol sales per person in Scotland are 20% higher than England and Wales. Equivalent to 477 pints of beer per year, for every single person 18 years or older.
Alcohol abuse costs the Scottish economy £3.56 Billion per year and is responsible for 96 hospital admissions every day.
Sadly this is just another lunatic knee jerk reaction policy from the Scottish Government.
They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for f
ks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.
It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for f
ks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
stevensdrs said:
Sadly this is just another lunatic knee jerk reaction policy from the Scottish Government.
They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for fks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.
It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
100% yes. The SNP government seems to be made up of people that have left school, never had a job or real world experience and come up with these knee jerk solutions. Also the same people that were bullied in school and never invited to house parties.They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for f
ks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
mickytruelove said:
stevensdrs said:
Sadly this is just another lunatic knee jerk reaction policy from the Scottish Government.
They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for fks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.
It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
100% yes. The SNP government seems to be made up of people that have left school, never had a job or real world experience and come up with these knee jerk solutions. Also the same people that were bullied in school and never invited to house parties.They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for f
ks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
Lord Marylebone said:
I would tend to agree regarding the weekly recommended limits.
But it's hard to argue with the other statistics, which are quite shocking.
Quite, but as scientific studies show the problems related to alcohol consumption are not linked to low cost. Repeating the politicians' logic that it is all shocking and something must be done about it will not change the fact that this is an ignorantly motivated and impotent measure (pun intended) being introduced by the ScotGov.But it's hard to argue with the other statistics, which are quite shocking.
Putting in place schemes that claim to solve problems but do not is more irresponsible than doing nothing as it cultivates a false sense of having dealt with the problem, thus less attention will be given to tackiling it properly in future. When it continues to happen the government will point to the fact that it has taken (useless) measures to solve it and therefor can nothing more or will manufacture a set of meanigless targets to suggest that the measure is working when in reality it isn't.
Decades of evidence from Scandinavia proves that high prices do not and will not deter problem drinking as the causes of alcohol abuse are known to be environmentally and culturally linked.
End. Of.
Edited by r11co on Saturday 18th November 12:46
mickytruelove said:
stevensdrs said:
Sadly this is just another lunatic knee jerk reaction policy from the Scottish Government.
They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for fks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.
It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
100% yes. The SNP government seems to be made up of people that have left school, never had a job or real world experience and come up with these knee jerk solutions. Also the same people that were bullied in school and never invited to house parties.They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for f
ks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
moanthebairns said:
Blended Scotch Whisky – up by £2.75 to £14
Glen’s Vodka – up 65p to £13.15
Frosty Jack’s – up £7.76 to £11.25
Buckfast – unchanged, £7.99
Red wine – up 96p to £4.15
20 cans of Tennent’s lager – up £5 to £18
Prosecco – unchanged, £6
Here are typical predicted price increases.
Well fk me, all thats going to happen is the alkie I know will swap his 2-3 bottles of frosty jack a day for Buckfast, Vodka or a cheeky wee Prosecco.
This could actually get much worse for many. His level of pishedness is kept in line with the fact he has to consume a large volume to get pished. He won't be spending almost an extra £8 on gut rot cider now. He'll buy buckie, or vokda (which are rocket fuel) and I can actually see it getting much worse.
There seems to have been an assumption that people enjoy drinking cheap cider and they will be discouraged by this due to the price.
Or, like is popular in the shed cities housing a lot of the illegally-cheap labour east europeans etc, £1/litre chemically produced gut rot "vodka".Glen’s Vodka – up 65p to £13.15
Frosty Jack’s – up £7.76 to £11.25
Buckfast – unchanged, £7.99
Red wine – up 96p to £4.15
20 cans of Tennent’s lager – up £5 to £18
Prosecco – unchanged, £6
Here are typical predicted price increases.
Well f
k me, all thats going to happen is the alkie I know will swap his 2-3 bottles of frosty jack a day for Buckfast, Vodka or a cheeky wee Prosecco.This could actually get much worse for many. His level of pishedness is kept in line with the fact he has to consume a large volume to get pished. He won't be spending almost an extra £8 on gut rot cider now. He'll buy buckie, or vokda (which are rocket fuel) and I can actually see it getting much worse.
There seems to have been an assumption that people enjoy drinking cheap cider and they will be discouraged by this due to the price.
stevensdrs said:
It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it.
I agree with everything you say but Buckfast is actually closer to £6 a bottle. Ask me how I know 
I live down in Devon now. You’d think it would be much easier for me to get a bottle to indulge my guilty pleasure, considering it’s made here...! Hardly anywhere stocks it but I have found a Pakistani gentleman who has a shop nearby who usually has some in.
Anyway, yes. There is a drink problem in Scotland and this price increase won’t do anything but turn the financially struggling alcoholics to cheap whisky or vodka, over the cider. In my opinion.
Edited by ColdoRS on Saturday 18th November 19:20
Glasgowrob said:
I smell opportunity 
minibus and trailer,
90 minute run to England
load up said van and trailer with cheap booze
90 minutes back to Glasgow
booze tourism
40 quid a head x8 twice a day sorted
People buying the cheap plonk most affected probably aren't the kind to plan and organise themselves though, or have funds for volume purchase etcminibus and trailer,
90 minute run to England
load up said van and trailer with cheap booze
90 minutes back to Glasgow
booze tourism
40 quid a head x8 twice a day sorted
hairyben said:
People buying the cheap plonk most affected probably aren't the kind to plan and organise themselves though, or have funds for volume purchase etc
i'll launch a booze cruise app they all have the latest iPhone so it will be fine menages and credit unions a plenty and the more enterprising will be booking my services 7 days a week , all for personal consumption you understand lolTheD said:
mickytruelove said:
stevensdrs said:
Sadly this is just another lunatic knee jerk reaction policy from the Scottish Government.
They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for fks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.
It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
100% yes. The SNP government seems to be made up of people that have left school, never had a job or real world experience and come up with these knee jerk solutions. Also the same people that were bullied in school and never invited to house parties.They brought in Air Gun licencing last year in a knee jerk reaction to one person being killed by a moron with an air rifle. They had an amnesty before licencing where thousands of perfectly good airguns were surrendered by law abiding owners to avoid having to get a licence. The morons of course will not have surrendered their guns and will not have applied for a licence. So a policy aimed at the minority ends up hurting the majority.
Now to tackle Scotland's Drink Problem, there is no doubt there is a problem, the policy is to tax everyone more to deter the minority from getting off their face every weekend. The social drinker will have to pay more and the Bams will still get royally pissed on anything they can lay their hands on. I mean for f
ks sake the other national drink is bloody Buckfast, made by English Monks who should know better and supplied in heavy glass bottles so your drunk Bam can smash someone over the head for fun. It's £12 a bottle by the way so hardly a cheap way of getting hammered but the Bams seemingly can afford it. The Scottish Government seem to think cheap cider causes the problems and feel it necessary to treble the price of it. Won't make a blind bit of difference.It's education that's needed, a cultural change away from the need to get drunk to have a good time. Oh wait, the Scottish Government is failing in the education department. Never mind, think of all that additional tax revenue!
When it was put to a vote only one MSP voted against it.
r11co said:
Driver101 said:
You do realise that it wasn't just SNP who wanted the minimum price?
When it was put to a vote only one MSP voted against it.
And your point is what exactly? It's a wrong-headed idea regardless.When it was put to a vote only one MSP voted against it.
The fact that only 1 MSP voted against the pricing shows it's hardly the SNP standing alone on this one.
Driver101 said:
The pricing of alcohol has been debated for donkey's years. It was far from a knee-jerk decision. The purchasing of multi-buy deals had already been stopped from years before.
The fact that only 1 MSP voted against the pricing shows it's hardly the SNP standing alone on this one.
The SNP forced the issue to the n'th degree through every available court in Europe. This shows that they prioritise winning over doing something that actually works. That others are falling into line with their unscientific virtue-signalling is neither here nor there.The fact that only 1 MSP voted against the pricing shows it's hardly the SNP standing alone on this one.
If they'd done their research and realised this was a counterproductive measure (as it will put more families into 'child poverty') they could have saved the time and expense of their legal pursuit and put it to better use.
Edited by r11co on Sunday 19th November 06:56
hairyben said:
People buying the cheap plonk most affected probably aren't the kind to plan and organise themselves though, or have funds for volume purchase etc
No - but all it takes is for some enterprising soul to set up a mobile offie, driving round council estates flogging cheap booze from the back of a van. Stick a quid 'surcharge' on each bottle - jobs a goodun.
TheJimi said:
Won't make a blind bit of difference, imo.
Just means that those desperate enough for alcohol who are priced out by the changes will be either driven to more desperate measures to get their hands on it, or will revert to some other form of high.
TBH true. For generations it's too late to do anything else. For future ones though at least still all the offers and double the pricing. You've got to start somewhere.Just means that those desperate enough for alcohol who are priced out by the changes will be either driven to more desperate measures to get their hands on it, or will revert to some other form of high.
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