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Thread: Minimum Unit Price

  1. #1
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    Default Minimum Unit Price

    What is your opinion of this?

    I see it as yet another government interference in the things that people enjoy doing. I don't agree with the idea that once they'd seen to the smokers they'd go after the drinkers, but you can see the luvvies charging their guns.

    I think a quite popular petition could be a maximum unit price...

  2. #2
    Humble Wordsmith ETA's Avatar
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    The main problem with it is that it's indiscriminate as it is context independent. What would be a more socially acceptable option would be to look on sales on alcoholic drinks in their setting rather than as a chemical unit. In any case, a minimum unit price will, like so many Government campaigns, ensure that the only people who suffer will be the moderate majority.

    I advocate that a more constructive approach would be to impose a minimum unit price on supermarket sales but not on pub prices - this would in part redress the relative3 costs between having a pint in your local and drinking in your home. It would have the effect of getting younger drinkers back into pubs where their drinking practices can mature among a balanced social circle rather than promoting street corner and in-house bingeing. Some distinction should also be between imported alcohol products and those produced locally, while the relative health benefits of different drinks should also be considered - lower unit prices for organic wines than for blended whiskies, for example.

  3. #3
    I'll stay on me own
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    You are spot on with this one Spinko.
    I have never smoked and think what they have done with smokers is not right,now the smoke police have seen them off they have nothing to do so they are now after the drinkers and i think they will win this one as well.
    I am glad i am not a younger drinker as i have hopefully only another 20 years proper drinking left in me.

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    This Space For Hire gillhalfpint's Avatar
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    I haven't smoked for 25 years, but have sympathy for them, and feel drinkers are the next target. People on trains are the worst hit for smokers. My sister in Oban has a problem planning routes to visit English relations as she has to allow stopping at stations where she can get outside for a ciggy. Cannot do a straight journey anywhere.
    Alcohol doesn't solve problems .... but then again, neither does milk.

  5. #5
    Old & Bitter oldboots's Avatar
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    The health facists aren't too fussy about the target, smokers, drinkers, fat eaters etc. all grist to their mill. The lessons learned in the anti-smoking campaign are now being used in the anti-drink campaign, so that's "de-normalization", false health scares especially about passive damage, dodgy research, misinformation/selective stats/downright lies, advertising bans, and the continuous drip feed of negative stories (see Radio 4 every bloody day). These people are our biggest enemy and they're getting too sucessful - look at Cameron's drivel last week about anti social drinking.

    At least Pete Brown is continuing the war against this shite here.

    Don't be misled that minimum unit pricing will only affect supermarkets and JDW, after a while it will be ratcheted up and we'll all suffer, did you know in the EU only Finland has a higher rate of beer duty to us, we pay 40% of all EU beer tax but only drink 13% of production and our duty rate is 8X France's, 10X Spain's and 11X Germany's? The whole of the drinks industry and its customers need to join together to defeat these Neo-Pro scum bags.



    PS, Just spotted this quote on the Curmudgeon Blog:

    "It may come as a shock to those who want to micromanage our lifestyles, but drinkers, smokers and lovers of fast food are not stupid. We’ve got the message that fags, booze and all the other wicked little pleasures are bad for us. The real reason that people engage in moderately unhealthy behaviours like these – so mildly unhealthy that we have to do them often and regularly over the course of decades to cause us serious harm – is that we enjoy them. We balance the long-term risks against short-term pleasure. That’s a far more sophisticated understanding of what it means to live life well than these grey and miserable latter-day Puritans could ever manage."
    Last edited by oldboots; 03-03-2012 at 19:27.

  6. #6
    Fully paid up beer belly Farway's Avatar
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    I reckon OB has it, the "health facists aren't too fussy about the target"

    Plus increased price, by whatever means or figleaf, equals more tax take one way or the other, which no doubt Boy George would love, especially if cloaked under a "health" headline by the Daily Mail & BBC
    I drink to make others more interesting

  7. #7
    Between pubs sheffield hatter's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by oldboots View Post
    "The real reason that people engage in moderately unhealthy behaviours like these – so mildly unhealthy that we have to do them often and regularly over the course of decades to cause us serious harm – is that we enjoy them. We balance the long-term risks against short-term pleasure. That’s a far more sophisticated understanding of what it means to live life well than these grey and miserable latter-day Puritans could ever manage."
    George Harrison (1943-2001), smoker, died of lung cancer, aged 58. George Best (1946-2005), drinker, died of complications following a liver transplant due to alcoholism, aged 59.

    Very sophisticated.
    Come On You Hatters!

  8. #8
    Fully paid up beer belly Farway's Avatar
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    Not quite sure what your point is, no doubt we can all swap anecdotes about our grannies / grandads who smoked 80 / drank 10 pints a day, or both, and lived to be 99. Plus of course the sophisticated, non smoking / drinking folk who died age 45
    I drink to make others more interesting

  9. #9
    Between pubs sheffield hatter's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Farway View Post
    Not quite sure what your point is...
    My point is that alcohol, nicotine and sugar are addictive. Most users are hooked at a young age and have very little control over their habit. Not all smokers die of lung cancer, but 98% of lung cancer deaths are smokers or ex-smokers. For the vast majority of drinkers, smokers and fast-food addicts, I would guess, there is no very "sophisticated understanding" of their life choices.

    And I think that the use of the phrase "health fascists" suggests that some of the contributors to this thread are not really making much of an informed choice about their own consumption. I agree that the beer duty escalator and minimum unit pricing are policies that are damaging to pubs, but to pretend that the harm caused by alcohol is the fantasy of "puritans" is ignoring the problem.
    Come On You Hatters!

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by sheffield hatter View Post
    My point is that alcohol, nicotine and sugar are addictive. Most users are hooked at a young age and have very little control over their habit. Not all smokers die of lung cancer, but 98% of lung cancer deaths are smokers or ex-smokers. For the vast majority of drinkers, smokers and fast-food addicts, I would guess, there is no very "sophisticated understanding" of their life choices.

    And I think that the use of the phrase "health fascists" suggests that some of the contributors to this thread are not really making much of an informed choice about their own consumption. I agree that the beer duty escalator and minimum unit pricing are policies that are damaging to pubs, but to pretend that the harm caused by alcohol is the fantasy of "puritans" is ignoring the problem.
    I think you are on the wrong forum sheffield hatter,

    This site is pro beer and pubs,and to say that we are all ill informed is wrong, we are not that thick that we dont know the slight risks of drinking beer but this is something that most people on this site do and enjoy doing.
    Last edited by Al 10000; 05-03-2012 at 14:52.

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