24-HOUR DRINKING: THE TRUTH

DAILY MAIL

says:

A year on, Blair's media friends have been praising the relaxation of licensing laws. For the TRUTH read this article that appears in a left wing magazine...

SEVERAL liberal commentators have claimed over the last few days that the Government's introduction of the 24-hour drinking licenses have had a beneficial effect on British society, and that those who criticized the relaxation of the law have been proved wrong.

Here, the Daily Mail reprints an article from the left -wing New Statesman magazine which offers a very DIFFERENT VIEW.

COMMENTARY

by

Sam Alexandroni

At 3am on a Saturday night in Croydon High Street, the bars and clubs are kicking out. Hundreds of young people pack the street, shouting drunkenly and milling around, reluctant to go home.  There is aggressive edge to the crowd that makes the heavy police presence reassuring.

'There's always a meat wagon and an ambulance parked here,' says Dean Leahy, 24. 'You get lots of fights. It's a war zone; the bouncers don't care what happens on the street and you can't police it. There are just too many people.'

It is one year since the licensing laws were changed and it's hard to imagine a scene more at odds with the continental cafe culture that ministers had hoped would flourish once drinking hours were extended.

'Nothing has changed,'

says a barman working in Yate's, a busy night spot on the High Street, It's the same story -except now everyone gets booted out between two and three in the morning.'

The Home Office and the Department of Health say there is 'no indication' that the change in licensing laws has had a negative impact on alcohol-related crime or public health. But that is not the point; Britain is in the grip of an alcohol epidemic that the Licensing Act has proved completely unable to arrest. It was supposed , at the very least to spread the flow of frustrated drunks on to the streets and, by ending the race to get tanked up before last orders, reduce crime and curb binge drinking.

Every Friday and Saturday night , 70 per cent of all A&E admissions and 80 per cent of pedestrian road deaths are alcohol - related while the cost of alcohol abuse to the UK economy is estimated at £20 billion a year.

A REPORT from ALCOHOL CONCERN earlier this month put the number of alcohol-related deaths at more than 22,000 a year-nearly three times the official 8,000.

Most alarming is the discovery that those least able to handle drink have taken to the bottle as never before.  The number of under -18s admitted to hospital with alcohol related conditions is UP by MORE THAN 20 PER CENT in the PAST FIVE YEARS.

Dr Nick Sherin, a member of the Royal College of Physicians 'Alcohol Committee, said:

'Deaths from liver disease have doubled in the past ten years and the people I am seeing are getting younger.'

The implications for future public health are disastrous. Worse, the full health impact of excessive alcohol on the young is still unknown.

 'The adolescent brain is vulnerable and it remains a strong possibility that heavy drinking could cause lasting damage,' says Sherin

Carole Whittingham, the national secretary for the Campaign Against Drinking and Driving, is deeply worried.

'Young people go out with the deliberate intention of getting as drunk as possible.' she says.

'Seven years ago, I would have said that young people were responsible and that drink-driving was primary a problem of middle -aged men. That's no longer the case.  We are seeing more young people and more young women convicted of drink-driving.'

It is not just that young people are drinking more; there has been a huge shift in gender behaviour. Teenage girls in Britain are now drinking more than boys, according to a recent European survey.  Almost a third (29 per cent) of female students admit drinking to excess at least three times a month, compared with 26 per cent of boys, while consumption among women of all ages has doubled over the past decade.

[Well we have always referred to those children and youths who have been around over the last ten years as Blair's children because it has been under New Labour that the excesses in ALCOHOL-DRUGS-PREGNANCY -CRIME -ILLITERACY-GAMBLING and whatever in their anything goes culture.  As with the Tobacco Industry scandal of a cover-up for may years of the TRUTH about their product we will no doubt see an attempt by others who are destroying our young people to evade their responsibility when their time comes.]

The causes for heavy drinking are complex, but the Medical Association identifies two key factors: PRICE and AVAILABILITY.

ALCOHOL is getting CHEAPER

In the past 40 years alcohol consumption per person (aged 15 plus) has doubled and the price of alcohol relative to income has halved. A third of all 24-hour licenses granted were given to supermarkets, where alcohol is cheapest. It is not surprising, then that consumption outside licensed premises is on the rise.

Pressure group Action on Addiction (AOA) is one of a number of organisations campaigning for an increase in the price of alcohol. Research shows that the higher the price of alcohol relative to income, the less the nation as a whole drinks,' says Nicola Brian, of AOA.

'We believe that raising the price would have a significant impact on young people who are more likely to have lower disposable incomes..'

According to Dean Terry , manager of The Ship in Croydon:

'There's a lot of pressure to sell as much alcohol as you can. On the one hand you are told to encourage sensible drinking and not to serve drunk people, but on the other you are supposed to drive sales.

SO WHERE IS THE LINE?

The reality is that no bar is going to stay open longer, yet be content to sell the same amount of alcohol as before.

The only hope of combating a growing disaster is to change public attitudes. last month, the Government launched its first national alcohol awareness campaign. The slick £4 million

'Know Your Limits' campaign

 is designed to shock.

In one TV ad, a drunken man, fuelled by Dutch courage, attempts to impress a group of girls by rescuing balloons caught high in some scaffolding.

He plunges to his DEATH.

YET THE DRINKS INDUSTRY IS STILL DOING WHAT IT HAS ALWAYS DONE: TRYING TO MAXIMIZE ITS SALES

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[New Labour handle their domestic programme as they do their foreign policy. First they get themselves in deep water by bringing in unsuitable or unnecessary legislation and embark on an illegal war and then later find that their policies have resulted in them having to spend millions on Awareness Workshops to remedy the disastrous effects of its actions.  WE hear that the Government is to supply a nanny squad to deal with difficult families whereas many people in the country feel that those more needful of  the corrective treatment are the members of Blair's Tartan clan .They have failed to understand the habits of the indigenous people they represent and have instead decided that they know better and we all know what that has meant for our People-our Constitution and our Country.]

[Font altered-bolding &underlining used -comments in brackets]

A longer version of this article appears in the current issue of the New Statesman.

NOVEMBER/06

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