[Closed] Minimum alcohol pricing

I paid £9 for a pint of 12% stuff last week in Brewdog Leeds.
was nice, but not something to drink on a session.

I thought you "enjoyed" a wee tipple of frosty jacks?

50p per unit minimum, so it won't really affect beer, but it will make wine very expensive, which won't please the missus.

around £4.50 a bottle will be the minimum price for wine IIRC

around £4.50 a bottle will be the minimum price for wine IIRC

There's more than 9 units in a bottle of wine isn't there, surely?

yeah, a bottle of red wine, typical strength will be about 9 or 10 units, so will likely impact wine when it's on offer or promotion (25% for 6 bottles, say) rather than the standard price.

Wine is usually between 9 and 11 units per bottle.

Ahh, yeh I suppose it won't really affect wine then either.

I suppose the law is just designed to stop the realy cheap strong stuff, so I guess it won't really affect most people.

I have no problem with the underlying idea, but I don’t think this is a good way to go. As it is a minimum price the extra “profit” goes to the shop, it would have been better as a tax where the state/society benefits.

extra “profit” goes to the shop

Is that true?.

it would have been better as a tax where the state/society benefits.

Yeh generally agree, however a blanket tax hike on alcahol would be unpopular and have everyone kicking off, I suppose this is an 'easier' way to do it..

More nanny state bollocks!

I work in the wine trade and generally anything under £5 a bottle isn't worth drinking so minimum pricing at 50p a unit won't hurt our sales. If anything, it might help them as supermarkets will struggle to push their £3.99 loss leader bottles. As others have said, beer drinkers won't be out of pocket either.

The only losers here are the white cider / superstrength lager producers, which can only be a good thing for society.

wrightyson - Member
More nanny state bollocks!

Yip, the snp are heavy into that kinda thing.

Ahh, yeh I suppose it won't really affect wine then either.

Well - look at you paying more than £4.50 a bottle! 😀

And it will all shift up accordingly to differentiate between perceived 'quality' wines and beers. So your £7 wine will become £9, your £13 box of Peroni will become £16 etc.

We all lose out.

Don't be sucked in by the 50p per unit not impacting prices for normal drinkers, it is the thin end of the wedge to get the principal established with minimum fuss.

devash - Member
I work in the wine trade and generally anything under £5 a bottle isn't worth drinking so minimum pricing at 50p a unit won't hurt our sales. If anything, it might help them as supermarkets will struggle to push their £3.99 loss leader bottles. As others have said, beer drinkers won't be out of pocket either.

The only losers here are the white cider / superstrength lager producers, which can only be a good thing for society.

re wine: will it push up prices in the current 10 to 20 quid bracket? there will just be an increase across the board, no?

It might be more effective to spend money on effective treatment programmes and other steps to tackle the underlying social problems that can lead to alcoholism.

But instead we're reminded there's no magic money tree unless votes need buying.

The only losers here are the white cider / superstrength lager producers, which can only be a good thing for society.

And "legal-high" producers will be winners.

The only losers here are the white cider / superstrength lager producers, which can only be a good thing for society.

And the big whisky distillers that sell them all their cheap shit alcohol...

I would suspect that the reason it was not done thru taxation was because the SNP do not have that power to do so.

It would be very easy to make a tax on alcohol based on the units that gave the same effect but would have to be a UK wide initiative

re wine: will it push up prices in the current 10 to 20 quid bracket? there will just be an increase across the board, no?

NOpe - all it does is set a floor below which the price cannot fall

whisky comes in at 28 units at 40%, so £14 minimum there.

beer minumum - pint, £1.15, 500ml, £1, 440ml, 90p.

We all lose out.

Only if we drink alcohol.... Which i very very rarely do. If it affects flavoured water in Tesco i may be worried.

The only losers here are the white cider / superstrength lager producers, which can only be a good thing for society.

Yep, as far as I can see the only drinks badly are affected are the ones being bought simply to get drunk (in most cases), and therefore not that different from substance abuse of other varieties.

As regards the superstength cheapo ciders - again my guess is the market for these will disappear as decent cider becomes the same price as industrial rotgut. Who would drink Frosty Jacks over say strongbow when they are the same price per unit alcohol?

Is there evidence to show that higher prices reduces alcohol addiction...?

NOpe - all it does is set a floor below which the price cannot fall

So all the cheap bottles just become a fiver and the fiver bottles stay the same? doubt that very much.

tbh, it's all a nonsense, price isn't really all that much of a factor in people getting wasted. the likes of bucky aren't even all that cheap, it's about 7 quid a bottle.

As regards the superstength cheapo ciders - again my guess is the market for these will disappear as decent cider becomes the same price as industrial rotgut. Who would drink Frosty Jacks over say strongbow when they are the same price per unit alcohol?

But they won't be the same price - the brands will price their products at a higher level. And the cheap stuff will be a bit dearer.

I'm declaring this - politicians kidding on they are doing their job.

All the alcoholics will have less money for food and bills.

Wether it will effect people who are yet to be alcoholics who would have otherwise become alcoholics I don’t know.

I remember the same wailing and gnashing of teeth when the smoking ban came about, and that's turned out not too bad...

Tbh, I'm not sure it'll really work, but I feel this country, and I mean Scotland in particular, needs something done to address our relationship with 'the swally'.

Oh, and TJ - Strongbow is 'decent' cider? 😯

Is there evidence to show that higher prices reduces alcohol addiction

Probably not but remember that this is about more than addiction, it is also meant to try and tackle the anti social and negative health effects of excessive drinking.

Frankly using economics is probably a better way of trying to nudge behaviour than anything else that is available.

@Nobeer - I remember being in Dublin with work about a year after the Irish introduced a smoking ban. Even in that short period there were noticeable health benefits.

The attitude to alcohol of a significant proportion of the UK's population is not going to be solved by a single solution. In the same way that there's a hardcore minority who continue to smoke there'll be a large number who will continue to misuse alcohol but they should be the exception rather than the norm.

Is there evidence to show that higher prices reduces alcohol addiction...?

No there isn't. As someone who has an alcoholic in the (extended) family I know that it will mean less money to spend on the essentials. Complete and utter bollocks. Education is the way to go not increasing the cost.

wrightyson - Member

More nanny state bollocks!

[img] [/img]

I don't think expensive toilet water is really the solution to alocoholism! 😆

Probably not but remember that this is about more than addiction, it is also meant to try and tackle the anti social and negative health effects of excessive drinking.

Then They should make the pubs and bars landlords responsible for having drunk people on there premises like they used to be and then they would not serve people who were already legless then turning them out on the streets to be a problem for our struggling police forces and nhs

No there isn't. As someone who has an alcoholic in the (extended) family I know that it will mean less money to spend on the essentials. Complete and utter bollocks. Education is the way to go not increasing the cost.

Education? who in their right mind doesn't realise alcoholism isn't a good place to be?.

As said earlier, it's not really designed to sort out acute alcoholism, but the social bingers who are at the start of that path.

I think.

I wonder if it'll be cheaper to shop at B&Q?

re wine: will it push up prices in the current 10 to 20 quid bracket? there will just be an increase across the board, no?

Minimum pricing isn't an increased tax as far as I understand. It just sets the legal minimum limit per unit. That extra cost doesn't get passed on to the government coffers.

whitestone - Member
@Nobeer - I remember being in Dublin with work about a year after the Irish introduced a smoking ban. Even in that short period there were noticeable health benefits.

[img] ?w=640[/img]

the smoking reduction looks to have been a long concerted effort

interesting the alcohol consumption graph.

[img] [/img]

i've always thought the pubs etc were much busier late 90s. early 2000s.

Oh, and TJ - Strongbow is 'decent' cider?

dunno - I don't drink cider but surely its better than frosty jacks

I think its aimed in a few ways. Kids with a fiver who want to get drunk, binge drinkers and alcoholics. the first of those it will certainly stoip. The second maybe. Not sure it will do much for the 3rd category but it might

I a fairly sure this was well thought out plan based on research not just an bright idea / knee jerk reaction

http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Health/Services/Alcohol/minimum-pricing

*polishes up moonshine still*

20p a unit to you mate, but you ain’t seen me, right?

That extra cost doesn't get passed on to the government coffers.

I believe there's evidence that supermarkets are usingg cheap alcohol as a loss leader too, just to entice folk into the shop.

It probably won't affect the serious alcoholics much - as others have said, they'll find a way anyway. But what it will affect is the occasional alcoholics - the kids who like to get hammered on a bottle of cheap cider, the people who drink two beers a night instead of one, people like that.

A bottle of wine will be about £4.50 minimum, a bottle of whisky about £14. So if you like an occasional drink, it'll still be possible to do that pretty cheaply. What will be more expensive is the 8% cider and the high-strength lager.

I'm looking forward to people becoming more discerning about what they think - tasting notes graffitied on park benches 😉

Wonder if it'll cause an increase in cheap imported/smuggled alcohol?

As regards the superstength cheapo ciders - again my guess is the market for these will disappear as decent cider becomes the same price as industrial rotgut. Who would drink Frosty Jacks over say strongbow when they are the same price per unit alcohol?

The big losers in this will be spirits drinkers. Looking at the Tesco website, pricing is currently,
Tesco own brand gin £10 - £11.00
Gordon's £14.50
Tanqueray £18.00
Edinburgh Gin £29.50
Now that the own brand stuff will have to be £14.00 I'd expect to see the others increase by £4.00 - £5.00 as well.

The cheap alcohol producers will put up thier prices to the shops, there not going to let the shops reap all the extra revenue especially if they are feeling the pinch of falling sales, then if they also produce more quality brands they may have to put the prices of those to meet the shortfall.

Wonder if it'll cause an increase in cheap imported/smuggled alcohol?

Possibly, who knows, but tbh I don't think the price hike is significant enough to warrant all that hassle.

I'm old enough to remember having to go to a special shop to buy alcohol, and a bottle of spirits was expensive enough to be a special occasion purchase.

Its too easy and cheap nowadays to just fling a bottle of voddy or two on top of the trolley at the supermarket.

I don't think the price hike is significant enough to warrant all that hassle.

The manager of Asda in Carlisle must be excited.

They've practically got their own slip road to the M74.

@seosamh - smoking has been on a general decline as your graph shows. I wonder how the numbers are distributed across social classes and age groups - personal observational evidence would indicate that there's a higher proportion in working class people and in what might be described as economically deprived areas. Older people are likely to carry on smoking as they are: a) addicted or b) probably justify it by "I'm 70 and it hasn't done me any harm" or "what's the point at my age?"

Imported drink? Hmm, maybe brexit can come to the rescue here (never thought I'd say that!) as the UK would be free to impose higher tariffs or lower personal allowances.

Anyone up for setting up booze cruises from Scotland to Berwick?

Oh and people don’t become alcoholics due to bad education, there is always a deep social problem in their somewhere. Sexual abuse as a child, abusive partners or other problems lead to alcohol abuse not “Oooh! I didn’t realise it was bad for me”.

You can slip into alcoholism drac it’s not always to mask som form of emotional or physical trauma

There is always a reason for an addiction chip

Oh and people don’t become alcoholics due to bad education, there is always a deep social problem in their somewhere. Sexual abuse as a child, abusive partners or other problems lead to alcohol abuse not “Oooh! I didn’t realise it was bad for me”.

Totally agree. There can also be a genetic link related to dopamine (neurotransmitter) levels in the brain and propensity towards addictive behaviours. Alcoholism can't be explained by social and economic variables alone.

Anyone up for setting up booze cruises from Scotland to Berwick?

[quote=[b]El Vino[/b] ]Don't be sucked in by the 50p per unit not impacting prices for normal drinkers, it is the thin end of the wedge to get the principal established with minimum fuss.

[img] [/img]

Oh and people don’t become alcoholics due to bad education, there is always a deep social problem in their somewhere

Not always.

Plenty folks that don't think they have an issue, 2 or 3 large lasses of red a night (Hey, red's good for you, right?) I have friends ( a married couple) that don't ever get drunk, don't go out much, but they have 2 large vodka n cokes each, every night. I'd bet there's about 4 pub measures in that vodka, that could easily lead to more later in life.

As I said, I'm not convinced it'll work, but something needs to change.

lol @ ygh!

Nobeerinthefridge - Member
Wonder if it'll cause an increase in cheap imported/smuggled alcohol?
Possibly, who knows, but tbh I don't think the price hike is significant enough to warrant all that hassle

I assume this will be linked to inflation too btw, as inflation will render it completely pointless soon enough.

There can also be a genetic link related to dopamine (neurotransmitter) levels in the brain and propensity towards addictive behaviour.

There is evidence to suggest that is not true at all though.

Plenty folks that don't think they have an issue, 2 or 3 large lasses of red a night (Hey, red's good for you, right?) I have friends ( a married couple) that don't ever get drunk, don't go out much, but they have 2 large vodka n cokes each, every night. I'd bet there's about 4 pub measures in that vodka, that could easily lead to more later in life.

Ok yes there are those that drink every night and don’t think it’s an issue but why not a large step from alcoholism it’s a big difference.

Drac - Moderator
There is always a reason for an addiction chip

Iceland seems to have a better way to solve the problem

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/stories-41973296/how-one-country-persuaded-teens-to-give-up-drink-and-drugs

Ok yes there are those that drink every night and don’t think it’s an issue but why not a large step from alcoholism it’s a big difference

Surely it's not volume dependant, but rather a dependancy? If someone only smokes 10 fags, as opposed to 60, are they not a smoker?.

TBH I think this is a good thing, rather it be a Tax levied rather some arbitrary “put prices up”

We are all too dependant on alcohol, from the two pints a week to the 4-5 bottles of red a week to the 1ltr bottle of whiskey a week.. we all drink too much.. why? Invariably to disguise some underlying issues we all have about society or relationships.

Alcohol will never go away, it’ll always be the accepted form of inebriation and Taxed according because it’s a) easy to do at source b) easy to sell and c) people love a drink. Alcoholics aren’t really those we see on park benches comatose anymore, it’s those that drive drunk to work and stumble through the day to sit on the sofa and open another bottle.

Yes, yes I’m a puritanical snob.

Wonder if it'll cause an increase in cheap imported/smuggled alcohol?

Probably not. I think that why they're talking of a minimum price at retail rather than slapping on more excise duty.

The booze may be smuggled but the corner shop still has to charge the minimum price. It'll be obvious if they're not, unless they are selling it under the counter in plain brown paper.

Upping excise duty will just mean more smuggling with no control over final price to the consumer, which is supposed to be the whole object of the exercise.

Maybe so but youre correct.

Alcohol cause a lot of harm and cost society a fortune. If increasing the price reduces that its a good thing.

Is there evidence to show that higher prices reduces alcohol addiction...?

Not sure, but you can guarantee theft will go up.

I'm old enough to remember having to go to a special shop to buy alcohol, and a bottle of spirits was expensive enough to be a special occasion purchase.

I quite like the North American system where you aren't allowed to sell alcohol over a certain % in supermarkets, meaning you have to make a special trip to state-approved liquor stores.

Personally, I don't think pushing the price up solves anything, it just means people who want to drink either spend more overall or go short on other things.

sweepy - Member
I'm old enough to remember having to go to a special shop to buy alcohol, and a bottle of spirits was expensive enough to be a special occasion purchase.

Me too. That graph basically shows a doubling of alcohol consumption since those days.

I'm happy to see this. I think it will hit the binge drinking culture which has grown up amongst young folk, and that can only be good.

Alcoholics will be alcoholics, and no legislation will stop them.

Is there evidence to show that higher prices reduces alcohol addiction...?

Seems to be from the scottish gov link I provided to their reasoning for this. I dint read the research to see if it looked decent quality but its clear this is a well thought out policy based at least on some evidence

Binge culture in Scotland/UK has to end. If this helps then I'm all for it. Unsure it'll do anything for those committed drinkers/addicts as they'll always find a way whether it's spending less on other things to afford the booze or just stealing it.

Wine generally £5/btl minimum most of the time and the 12 pack of Corona 😳 I bought at the weekend was a tenner in Tesco. 1.7 units in a 330ml bottle, so will become £10.20 to comply.

Then They should make the pubs and bars landlords responsible for having drunk people on there premises like they used to be and then they would not serve people who were already legless then turning them out on the streets to be a problem for our struggling police forces and nhs

We are all too dependant on alcohol, from the two pints a week to the 4-5 bottles of red a week to the 1ltr bottle of whiskey a week.. we all drink too much.. why? [u]Invariably to disguise some underlying issues we all have about society or relationships[/u].

Really? I probably drink too much, but only because I enjoy it! I'm pretty sure it's nothing to do with issues with my relationships or with society.

As for whether higher prices for cheap high alcoholic drinks, it will simply make it more difficult for people to afford it, so its a step.

Apparently we spend £3 billion pounds in Scotland treating the effects of alcohol

England also spends £3 billion pounds on the same treatment

The key difference being our population is 1/10th of England's 😯

Be careful what you infer from those figures...

Sounds like Scotland are maybe funding the problem where as England aren’t.