Alcohol Minimum Pricing

[odyssey06]

when they removed alcohol from supermarket loyalty points & vouchers i reduced the amount i bought, and this will probably reduce it further (i didn't drink much to begin with). but it will be interesting to see if there's a bigger selection of wine at 12%, which would suit me. Most wines seem to be 13 or 14%. the hospital stats would be most interesting, to see if there's any reduction in a&e admissions due to alcohol

I'm curious as to whether there would be more of a push to discount 'premium' lower alcohol wines due to MUP.
When I started drinking red wine 12.5% was standard, lately due to climate change it has creeped up to 13%+

I suppose there's more scope with white wines, red wines at that % are thin on the ground and sometimes taste that way too

Tesco have this Italian red for €7 which is 11.5%. I found it too light tbh, maybe one for lunch or chilled in summer.

Ca De Lago Cabernet Sauvignon - Tesco Groceries

Cabernet Sauvignon - Red Italian Wine

www.tesco.ie

Similar story with their Isla Negra range reduced to €7.50 which are 12%

Isla Negra Cabernet Sauvignon 75Cl - Tesco Groceries

Cabernet Sauvignon

www.tesco.ie

More promising, from Eurospar is the Angelica Chianti which iirc was 12% and very nice, I think that is €9.99.

 

[MrEarl]

I know I'm digressing a bit here, sorry, but if you are open to trying a non alcoholic white wine, give this one a try :

Leitz Eins Zwei Zero (Riesling)​

There's also a sparkling version, which is also quite good

(We probably need a seperate thread for non alcoholic wines, and maybe one also for beers, and spirits)

 

[joe sod]

If people are going to NI, how much would you have to be drinking to make any significant saving? Is it a bit like driving to the petrol station in the next town to save a few pennies?

maybe it doesn't make sense when you add up all the costs just for the alcohol, but it will be the tipping point to actually travel north for other things. You might use getting alcohol as the excuse but combine it with a night out in Belfast where you can go and see live music and stay out until 1am in the pubs if you like.

As for Scotland bringing in MUP in 2018, they set it at 50p a unit equivalent to 60c in euros here but we set it at 1 euro a unit that is just way too high, Why have they set it at such a high level almost twice the level of Scotland? that is just lunacy. It won't affect the champagne parties in Iveagh house, no cheap beer or even Prosecco at that only the finest Moet champagne and all at our expense

 

[Gordon Gekko]

if you are open to trying a non alcoholic white wine

Sorry Mr Earl, I don’t understand…what’s a non alcoholic white wine?

 

[Interest%]

Is Alcohol a drug? Just curious to know. Before when i used to smoke, one time i was in a kinda swanky bar, I had a snotty nose person who was drinking wine comment at me when i came in from the smoking area for having disgusting drug addiction.

 

[mathepac]

Is Alcohol a drug?

Yes alcohol is a drug, an intoxicant, a central nervous system depressant, like spamspamspam and heroin.

 

[Baby boomer]

As has been pointed out many times before, the Mediterranean countries with low alcohol prices don't seem to have a problem with excessive drinking. Apart from the tourists who go there from high-alcohol-priced countries like Ireland and UK!

Our alcohol culture is a far more complex issue than a simple price/consumption/abuse relationship. The same idiot politicians that championed this measure will be first in the queue when it comes to the obligatory photo-op with visiting heads of state being brought for their pint in an "authentic" Irish pub. Go figure.

 

[Steven Barrett]

All I can say to that Steven is that we have a very unusual sense of what things should cost if you honestly think €42 for 24 cans of beer is expensive. €20 for a slab or beer is just wrong imho. It makes an absolute joke of the Drink Sensibly campaign if you could then go out with 24 cans for just €20. It's the way of the world these days, buy a chicken for less than half the hourly minimum wage, 8 cans of beer for one hours wage, we've completely lost the run of value. Anyways, I digress, simply put I fully agree with the MUP.

When something used to be €20 and is now €42, they have just doubled the price. That makes it expensive. Don't know what minimum wage has got to do with it either. When I get an Indian takeaway for my family, that is a half days work for someone on the minimum wage. Do I think about it like that? No.

Our alcohol culture is a far more complex issue than a simple price/consumption/abuse relationship. The same idiot politicians that championed this measure will be first in the queue when it comes to the obligatory photo-op with visiting heads of state being brought for their pint in an "authentic" Irish pub. Go figure.

We have to move away from the pub culture. Irish drinking culture is around spending hours in a dark room drinking. We have to move away from that.

There was a young guy in my office from South Africa who had little interest in drinking or going to the pub. He said that there isn't many places to meet people in Ireland outside the pub. There are a few activity places but not much. That is what Irish culture is built on and we will only move away from it if we open it up.


*Btw, the MUP has absolutely no impact on me. I'm a hipster craft beer drinker and you won't get anything for near €1...or €2 for that matter.

 

[NoRegretsCoyote]

If you want to tackle excessive drinking then excessive drinking, not moderate drinking.

Here's an idea. Everyone gets an allowance of 10 units a week or whatever that they can buy at the retail price. After you've used up your allowance you pay a much higher price. (And all of the difference to the Exchequer, not into the retailer's margins like with MUP).

This way sensible drinkers get to drink sensibly at current cost, and excessive drinkers have to pay heavily for the social harms that they cause.

It's not impossible to operationalise, sale points of alcohol are already pretty well regulated.

 

[Leper]

For the past four years I've spent a minimum of 5 months per year in the south of Spain. The supermarkets open at 8.00am seven days per week and alcohol can be bought at 8.01am. I've bought cans of Levante, San Miguel, for 0.30c each and paid even less for shop brands. A bottle of wine equivalent to the stuff we paid €6.00 last week can be bought for 0.50c/€1.00 in Spain.

The only time I saw some Spanish teenagers drunk is when they are leaving night clubs around 3.00am - 6.00am. My Spanish neighbours give wine to their young teenage kids during lunch and dinner. Usually, the teenagers mix their red wine with Coca-Cola and other soft drinks like Lemon, White Lemonade. I've never seen these teenagers drunk. They've learned from their parents how to drink alcohol properly. Alcohol consumption is no big deal to them.

The same Spanish teenagers see drunken lager louts from the UK and Ireland making nuisances of themselves in public. The Spaniards learn from this. The local mayor has banned the drinking of alcohol on public roads and beaches. The local police enforce the laws and hey! - they're being allowed to do what they are paid to do. The Policía Local prosecute transgressors. There's no point in telling the Policía that drunken display by my son is out of character so please don't prosecute.

Go to Cork's College Road and see drunken displays by educated 3rd Level students almost nightly and sometimes during the day. Newspaper reports indicate that our Gardaí don't want to prosecute such students because of the implications of a court appearance and likely being banned from entry to USA etc. That problem area of Cork now has some landlords prosecuted for the drunken transgressions of their student tenants. The good people who reside fulltime in the College Road area are fed up with drunken students for years. Talk to any student who has had to go to court for being drunk and disorderly and you'll find that he was the only person in the group for prosecution and others had representations made to ensure no prosecution for the chosen few.

Enter Ireland's Alcohol Aware people and they decide that us decent law-abiding people must pay more for alcohol because of those who abuse the laws. Is this the answer to Irelands Alcohol Problem? They think so - I don't.

 

[Peanuts20]

We have a cultural issue when it comes to drink in this country. Similar to what another poster said about Spanish behaviour, I've sat in restaurants in the south of France and watched teenagers come in, sit down and have a meal and leave with no adults with them. Here, they are more likely to be making a nuisance of themselves half cut on the street. So MUP, whilst not a solution in itself, is, in my view, one step in the right direction. As has happened in other countries, it will lead to a reduction in alcohol consumption and may migrate consumption away from home drinking and back towards pubs. So it's good news for the vintners, bad news for the offies

Some people have mentioned more cross border shopping, yes, that will happen but for a lot of people (most people to be honest), we live too far from the border to make it worth our while. And yes, it may lead to a rise in other substance abuse as well but all of those things are not reasons to try this. What is disappointing about it is that it is being done in isolation. If it was coupled with increased investment in support for those with alcohol problems, greater policing of anti-social behaviour etc, I'd be more in favour. But its a start in tackling our issues.

 

[Cervelo]

For the past four years I've spent a minimum of 5 months per year in the south of Spain...

Have to agree with you there Lep re the Spanish attitude towards drinking, like you I've yet to see a really drunk Spaniard on my travels
I see then drinking and drinking what seems like quite a lot but they don't drink pints only glasses of beer or bottles
(though I believe the real reason for that is a pint doesn't keep cool during the summer)
When I got here last year and was catching up with people I was told a story of an English guy who came to stay for six months
By the end of month one he was banned from the three local pubs so he went to the shops instead for his beer
After month two the local Mayor summoned his landlord to the town hall for a discussion
And by the end of month three he was gone!!

I personally think putting the price of drink up is not the answer, the answer is changing our attitude to drink and our tolerance of the people who abuse it. The Spanish drink and probably drink as much as we do if not more but you just don't really see it out on the streets like in Ireland

 

[Steven Barrett]

If you want to tackle excessive drinking then excessive drinking, not moderate drinking.

Here's an idea. Everyone gets an allowance of 10 units a week or whatever that they can buy at the retail price. After you've used up your allowance you pay a much higher price. (And all of the difference to the Exchequer, not into the retailer's margins like with MUP).

This way sensible drinkers get to drink sensibly at current cost, and excessive drinkers have to pay heavily for the social harms that they cause.

It's not impossible to operationalise, sale points of alcohol are already pretty well regulated.

Will never work and would be impossible and very costly to monitor.

And I already think we live in a nanny state before letting the state know about my alcohol consumption. It's only Google, Apple and Dunnes Stores that are allowed to know that.

 

[NoRegretsCoyote]

Will never work and would be impossible and very costly to monitor.

Not really it could be anonymised a bit like with the Covid cerficiates. You show your QR and ID and there's a pass/fail. You could have IT safegauards in place so that it is anonymised and deleted weekly, etc. There's only a few thousand (already-licenced) points of sale for alcohol. If you don't anyone to know your consumption you just pay the higher price.


I agree a huge political challenge but it's technically feasible!

 

[Steven Barrett]

Not really it could be anonymised a bit like with the Covid cerficiates. You show your QR and ID and there's a pass/fail. You could have IT safegauards in place so that it is anonymised and deleted weekly, etc. There's only a few thousand (already-licenced) points of sale for alcohol. If you don't anyone to know your consumption you just pay the higher price.


I agree a huge political challenge but it's technically feasible!

How much would it take to create the IT programme.

And you know it's never gonna happen

 

[Baby boomer]

Not really it could be anonymised a bit like with the Covid cerficiates. You show your QR and ID and there's a pass/fail. You could have IT safegauards in place so that it is anonymised and deleted weekly, etc. There's only a few thousand (already-licenced) points of sale for alcohol. If you don't anyone to know your consumption you just pay the higher price.


I agree a huge political challenge but it's technically feasible!

But think of the potential for, ahem, creative redistribution of the quotas for teetotalers.

 

[losttheplot]

I wonder will it be the next generation where we'll see the affect of minimum pricing. Whether it will be a positive or negative one, I don't know. Maybe cans of lager will be an option along side other recreational substances available from dealers

 

[Leo]

How much would it take to create the IT programme.

And you know it's never gonna happen

Agreed, it would require hundreds of millions and be a security and privacy nightmare. It might be possible somewhere like Sweden with a very limited alcohol retail environment, but not where we have north of 12,000 outlets.

 

[Leo]

Maybe cans of lager will be an option along side other recreational substances available from dealers

Does anyone really think that lots of people who can can't afford €40 for a slab of cans are going to instead splash out €100 for a score (1.75g) of cocaine or ~€20 for a gram of spamspamspam? Why switch a habit you can no longer afford for one that costs more? Note Ireland is one of the most expensive countries in Europe for illicit drugs.

Has minimum pricing in other jurisdictions led to any significant uptick in the consumption of illegal drugs?

 

[losttheplot]

Does anyone really think that lots of people who can can't afford €40 for a slab of cans are going to instead splash out €100 for a score (1.75g) of cocaine or ~€20 for a gram of spamspamspam? Why switch a habit you can no longer afford for one that costs more? Note Ireland is one of the most expensive countries in Europe for illicit drugs.

Has minimum pricing in other jurisdictions led to any significant uptick in the consumption of illegal drugs?

I jokingly meant dealers may start supplying cheap alcohol ( homemade stuff).