So the SNP are determined to go ahead with their plan to stop the sale of “cut-price” alcohol. Why? To cut the “misuse” of alcohol. They propose to make the minimum price of alcohol about 40p per unit and ban promotions on alcohol. How stupid can they be? Raising the price of alcohol won’t prevent any misuse

Sir Liam Donaldson, the Chief Medical Officer, tried to explain his decision to advise that alcohol for for under 15s should be prohibited by parents, by using some of the most bizarre reasoning I have heard in recent years. Firstly he tried to debunk the arguments that many people give that a little bit of alcohol for teenagers can make teens more responsible with alcohol later on by arguing that...

The term "units of alcohol" should be scrapped in favour of centilitres of pure alcohol, the Tories say.

From AOLNews: Public Health Minister Dawn Primarolo will announce the new Alcohol Improvement Programme at the National Alcohol Conference in Nottingham. It is hoped the £6 million* measures will help reduce alcohol-related harm. They include establishing regional alcohol managers, pulling together local information, and increasing access to specialist treatments. Twenty of the most deprived...

Alcohol Concern calls for powers over the licensing and pricing of alcohol to be devolved to Wales

Efforts by Sweden to tackle alcohol abuse in Europe look set to come to the boil during the latter half of its six-month EU presidency. The drinks industry is gearing up for a counter-offensive against an expected push to increase prices and restrict alcohol advertising.

New figures published today by the Greater London Alcohol and Drug Alliance (GLADA) show fewer young Londoners are using drugs, particularly cocaine. The report also reveals that while both drug use and alcohol consumption by young people is lower in London than the rest of the UK, the number of 11 – 18 years admitted to hospital for alcohol related illnesses has increased. Clearly the fall in

Via the Kitchen, I see that Comic Relief is chucking money at Fake Charities: In 2004, Comic Relief funded Alcohol Concern and London Drug and Alcohol Network to produce an online toolkit that would help local alcohol leads develop and implement cross cutting local alcohol strategies. This means that people giving money to Comic Relief are actually then handing the money over to an organisation th...

Liberal Conspiracy has uncovered evidence that strongly suggests that a parliamentary committee which, last week, came out in favour of introducing a statutory minimum unit price for alcohol, was given misleading evidence on the scale of alcohol-related deaths in the UK.

Commenting on KPMG’s report which finds that the alcohol industry has failed to act to tackle problem drinking, Liberal Democrat Shadow Culture, Media and Sport Secretary, Don Foster said: "This report provides more damning evidence that existing legislation to tackle alcohol misuse is not being enforced. The alcohol industry simply isn’t paying a blind bit of notice to the Government....