Drunk tank

Can’t believe no one has done this……
Wahoooooo. Free hotel after a night out on the lash. 😀

are we copying the Americans again?

Are we talking nonsense again?

Cameron is. 🙂

Drunk tanks – whats the difference with the police cells used now?

Yo will still need someone to provide control and restraint, you will still need medical cover.

Years ago there was one in Edinburgh according to thd old timers I talked to. One large room with a central drain in the floor. You were best to get in early to get a space around the edge and the latecomers got the centre where the pish all drained into

As for minimum pricing – a good idea but it does make me laugh. Tories and Labour adopted this as policy for Westmister while opposing it in Holyrood . Can’t bear to back a SNP idea

Lot of rubbish talked about minimum pricing affect all drinkers – pish as they say – nothing I drink costs less than 40p a unit

I can’t see minimum pricing working.

I mean it’s not as if drugs are cheap, but plenty manage to afford them.

TBH, I heard this on the radio this morning, and really, it’s not really the governments business what/how much I drink, wish they would just piss off trying to run my life.

Lot of rubbish talked about minimum pricing affect all drinkers – pish as they say – nothing I drink costs less than £40p a unit

Jings; £40 a unit! So vintage Claret washed down with single cask,limited run Islay Malts. Bllody fat-cat Edinburgers.

Emsz – a good point you make, but some people are clearly not capable of running their own. So where do you draw the line?

So vintage Claret washed down with single cask,limited run Islay Malts

It’s the NuSocialist’s tipple of choice don’t ya know 😉

I ended up in a drunk tank once in my youth for telling a Policeman he looked like sloth from the goonies. It wasn’t like a hotel in anyway whatsoever.

MAP is just another way of the judgemental ruling class saying that only the middle class and they can be trusted to drink, while the poor must be taxed into abstainance.

😳

extraneous £ edited out

Great now when I run out of taxi money I have somewhere free to stay 🙂

I still can’t get the Pogues ‘Fairy Tale of New York’ out of my head…

“T’was christmas evening… in the drunk tank…”

Its all just typical political bluster. Typical Call-me-Dave. Grab the headlines for a couple of days, keep the Daily Mail on-side, before the ‘policy’ disappears into the ether. Never to be heard of again

Remember Blair’s ‘marching yobs to cashpoints to pay on-the-spot fines?

Same fing innit?

Well that died a death when Ewan Blair was found slumped in the gutter…

it’s not really the governments business what/how much I drink, wish they would just piss off trying to run my life

This comment is fair enough in relation to responsible people, but there are a (seemingly vast) number of people who appear incapable of treating alcohol responsibly which has (often serious) repercussions – perhaps these people need treating like an adolescent seeing as they’re behaving one.

If you read enough newspapers (and the readers comments where available) one thing you hear over and over again when any issues occur is “the Government should do x, y and z to address this” … and when they do try and do x, y or z everyone complains that they’re interfering too much and it’s becoming a nanny state.

You can’t have it both ways.

Either society takes responsibility for itself (which it is failing to do in many areas), or Government needs to step in like a Parent.

But it’s not just drink, the govt seems to take an almost obsessive interest in what you eat as well…

it’s not really the governments business what/how much I drink, wish they would just piss off trying to run my life

If you end up in A&E or in a police cell or with long term alcohol related health issues, then it becomes the business of every tax-payer.

Using that argument you could justify a ‘health tax’ on mountain bikes and gear as people are bound to fall off and hurt themselves.

If you end up in A&E or in a police cell or with long term alcohol related health issues, then it becomes the business of every tax-payer.

This. It costs tax payers to clean up the mess after everyones ‘saturday night out’, A&E expenses, ambulances, police resource etc… because people don’t know when they’ve had to much and how to control themselves. This country is broken in the way we seem to applaud people who drink to excess and give kudos to people boasting about how much they can drink.

Kinda sad really.

Using that argument you could justify a ‘health tax’ on mountain bikes and gear as people are bound to fall off and hurt themselves

I’m not sure there are many other activities that are such a drian on the system as drinking. I don’t see A&E rammed on a Friday or Saturday night with Mountain Bikers, or police cells overcrowed with lycra clad roadies.

But it’s not just drink, the govt seems to take an almost obsessive interest in what you eat as well…

That’s because people’s diet is a major problem as well.

Why not have a vomit tank for people who have eaten too much junk food? It would save the taxpayer so much in long-term health care! Or why not have an individual ration each week of govt approved food and drink as we are all incapable of making the correct decision about what we consume into OUR bodies?

Jon – Glentress / innerliethan put half a dozen people in Borders general on average I beleive – needing more expensive care than monitoring and kicking out generally. Local ambulance service has had to buy a 4×4 ambulance.

we are all incapable of making the correct decision about what wwe consume into OUR bodies

Yes, most people are incapable based on what can be seen in most cities on an average weekend, and these people are a huge drain on resources during that time.

But it’s not just drink, the govt seems to take an almost obsessive interest in what you eat as well…

I agree with this to an extent – info/advice is fine and necessary.

Although after a point I’d use the same arguement, considering the implications for society due to the growing obesity problem … if people can’t/won’t take responsibility for themselves, someone’s got to do it.

Or should the Govt just sit back and let people eat/drink themselves into health problems and an early grave?

Yeah, but let’s imagine everyone gives up the fags and drink and takes up sport, instead of drunks u would just have loads of sports injuries. 😀 instead and Cameron would be telling us to stop!!

The radio just said looking after all the drunks costs £90.00 per year per taxpayer. I wonder how much Afghanistan is costing?

Everything costs something y’know?

Jon – Glentress / innerliethan put half a dozen people in Borders general on average I beleive – needing more expensive care than monitoring and kicking out generally. Local ambulance service has had to buy a 4×4 ambulance.

Fair enough TJ, but you’re talking about specific MTB areas. You’re not really suggesting that the country as a whole spends a comparable amount on mountain bikers than alcohol related a&e admissions? which is what I was getting at really. The individual cost per patient may be higher, but the over all cost isn’t, even in Borders general I would guess.

Alcohol deserves more focus than mountain biking as a problem for the NHS.

£90.00 per year per taxpayer

I can think of much better things to put that money towards than scraping the inebriated off the pavement every Saturday night.

Perhaps the government should spend their time looking at why some people drink so much, rather than increasing the cost of living for everyone.

Putting the price of alcohol up will do nothing to curb binge drinking.

Loads of football related injuries every sat and sun.
Can we tax the hell out of that please. 🙂

Using that argument you could justify a ‘health tax’ on mountain bikes and gear as people are bound to fall off and hurt themselves.

yep fat tax*, alchy tax and smoking tax all seem like sensible ideas to me but if we start on that track then I’m sure there’s plenty of folk out there who think mtb tax, 5aside football tax and allsorts of other activity tax would be a good idea. Not sure I want to see that.

*tax, fine, refusal to treat at hospital whatever

Yeah, but let’s imagine everyone gives up the fags and drink and takes up sport, instead of drunks u would just have loads of sports injuries

The difference would be that people who drink and eat junk all the time are more likely to end up wrecks in old age and costing the taxpayer a lot more money than those who exercise and keep fit.

I wonder how much Afghanistan is costing?

It’s a bit spurious, as the two things are unrelated.

However – I wonder if that £90 is the actual cost of sorting them all out, or the NET cost after the tax revenue they bring in? They pay an awful lot of tax on all that booze, I wonder how much the treasury would lose if they stopped bingeing and spent their money on something else instead?

Jon – Glentress / innerliethan put half a dozen people in Borders general on average I beleive – needing more expensive care than monitoring and kicking out generally. Local ambulance service has had to buy a 4×4 ambulance.

It’s all about cost vs benefits tho isn’t it. If, say, 1000 people a week ride at Inners/Glentress and all have better health as a result of getting some exercise, the benefit (or cost savings even, if you assume they therefore consume less healthcare) of this offsets the cost of patching up 6 or so people in A&E (although the local NHS Trust probably don’t see it this way as they are footing the cost without seeing much of the benefits!).

If 1000 people go out and get lashed on a Friday night and 6 or so end up in A&E/the cells, the costs are clear but I’m struggling to find any benefits, apart from to the profits of pub chains….

If 1000 people go out and get lashed on a Friday night and 6 or so end up in A&E/the cells, the costs are clear but I’m struggling to find any benefits

1000 people.. say 9 pints or equivalent each that’s 9000 pints. Roughly 40p/pint depending on the beer, plus 20% on £3 that’s £9k in govt revenue. Then there are more fringe economic inputs – taxi fares, the profits of the pub landlords, the fancy clothes and shoes people buy to drink in.

If 1000 people go to a trail centre on a weekend – someone else work that out I’ve got expenses to do. Petrol duty, some of them will have a car solely for this purpose. Also the cost of their bikes should be factored in.

shoes people buy to drink in

People buy shoes just for drinking in?! Wow.

Perhaps the government should spend their time looking at why some people drink so much, rather than increasing the cost of living for everyone.

Putting the price of alcohol up will do nothing to curb binge drinking.

This. But that would be too much like hard work. A knee jerk reaction like minimum pricing is far easier. Governments need to realise that taxation and/or fiddling with pricing isn’t the only answer to every problem.

TJ – Local ambulance service has had to buy a 4×4 ambulance.

I would respectfully suggest that it would be prudent for a rural ambulance service to own one anyway… MTBers are not the only punters…

Anyone who thinks that the lack of personal responsibility demonstrated by a significant minority of utter t@&£s isn’t a real problem that needs addressing, should spend a shift with a weekend nightshift Ambo crew or Cas unit… 😯

FWIW, I think this drunk tank idea could be a good idea, implemented properly and sufficiently expensive/unpleasant as to act as a real deterrent, of which there really isn’t right now. The police won’t even have them in there cells any more, (apparently it looks bad when they die choked on there own vomit. Personally I couldn’t give a shit…)

As an A&E doctor who still occasionally rides an MTB I probably have the right to an opinion on this….

I don’t mind treating anyone who turns up, it’s kinda what I get paid for. However it annoys me having to treat people who turn up for no other reason than they are absolutely wasted. I don’t mind if you have had a few drinks and fallen over, it happens to the best of us, but if your only complaint is that you have got so drunk that you’ve shit yourself I’m not entirely sure how that suddenly becomes my problem.

With regard to the ‘people injure themselves getting fit’ argument I disagree. People don’t go out on their bikes with the express intent of injuring themselves, these are called accidents; people do go out on a night out with the express intent of getting so wasted they can no longer stand/getting into a fight.

Minimum pricing – this, I think, would be a good idea. There are bars in the city where I work where you can get a treble and a mixer for under £2. This, plus other ‘Happy Hour’ type drinks promotions, encourages people to drink far more than is sensible, in too short a period of time. I accept that there is an argument for peoples liberty to do as they please, as put forward by Emsz above, but a large proportion of society have repeatedly shown that they will not take responsibility for their own actions, and this is where the government has to step in. Minimum pricing would not affect most peoples drinking but it would mean that a subsection of our society would be able to afford either less shots on a night out, or less nights out; both of these are good things.

Cynic-al – drugs are on the whole very cheap. Cheaper than a night on the lash. Ecstasy currently retails at a fiver for two pills in my neck of the woods and heroin is down to around four quid a wrap, cocaine is around £20 a gramme. It is being addicted and requiring ever increasing doses and not having a job that makes it seem expensive. (FWIW I wish the government would get around to legalising and controlling ecstasy as I very rarely see anyone who has taken too many E’s and got in a fight/fallen over and shit themselves.)

As for the costs…. It’s not just the alleged £90 per taxpayer, which must include chronic alcohol related problems as most of the inebriated I see don’t actually require anything doing other than paring in a wheelchair and keeping an eye on until they are sober enough to clean up their own vomit/poo (yes, we do make them). However, it’s not just the monetary costs, I do have to spend some time making sure that these people are actually just drunk and not injured/hypoglycaemic etc. This time could be better spent doing something more useful, like looking after your gran in cubicle seven while she has a heart attack……

Anyway, enough prattling on from me…. Any questions?