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MPs call for a minimum alcohol pricing

Sun, 01/10/2010 - 18:29 — Hugo_Minney

So Scottish MP's are concerned we will lose an ancient Scottish tradition? Alcohol unit pricing at 40p per unit only hurts those who buy very cheap alcohol, the people who buy alcohol to get drunk. The tradition that MPs get misty eyed about is the Scottish whisky industry, and I for one, have never heard of whisky at less than 40p/ unit.

Know your limitsPeople are dying out there. Yes, we of the society have become rich enough to kill ourselves, and unfortunately, the nanny state leads us to believe that we can do whatever we like because the Health Service will put it all right again.
Dare I say it, the funds the run their election campaigns? Or is it even more sinister than that? This isn't about taking away freedoms, this is about preserving life.
Come on you wimps, stand up for what is right for once. And let us hope that this minimum pricing also applies in the House of Commons bar.

 

Comments

Tue, 08/10/2010 - 09:19 — yuri_D

Cheap prices are better than

Cheap prices are better than those of which we can't afford to buy. Thanks for the creation of credit loans. Debt indicators -- IRS info about back taxes and other debts taxpayers owe -- are disappearing. Someone who has a good tax refund may have it all held by the IRS because of financial obligations owed or back taxes and is told through debt indicators.

I read this here: Demise of debt indicators puts hurt on refund anticipation loans

Banks trying to determine whether to give someone a short-term loan depending on their tax refund will use debt indicators to make their decision.
 

Wed, 01/20/2010 - 20:48 — Hugo_Minney

Letter to my MP

Dear Dr Blackman-Woods (MP for Durham City, Labour)

 
I am very concerned to see the debate going on in Scotland over minimum alcohol pricing.  I hope that MPs will have more integrity in the Palace of Westminster. I hope you will recognise the 30-40 000 lives, and around £2.7bn NHS costs, associated with alcohol problems every year.
 
You and I buy wine and beer at prices probably a lot higher than the unit minimum price of 50p.  You and I are, to tell the truth, probably fairly ordinary – we don’t drink to excess, smoke to excess, nor are we paid vastly outside the normal range.  So who will actually be affected by this minimum price?  I suspect, as do many in the health community, that it will only affect those who are currently killing themselves with cheap drink, and who – frankly – deserve better.
 
You have a history of taking a principled line, of stopping “entertainment and social activities” which are degrading.  I trust you will support a minimum unit price.  I wonder if this is a good time to suggest that alcohol should not be available for sale in shops that also sell food?  Off-licenses can become dens of iniquity again, selling cigarettes, alcohol, and perhaps permitted to sell those foods classified as “snacks” which attract the higher VAT rate.  Supermarkets can restore food to their shelves, food which was pushed out to make room for acres (sorry hectares – we didn’t join the metric system that long ago) of drink – usually at cut prices and heavily promoted.  It would inconvenience me, and it would probably inconvenience you. But it would reduce drinking from volume to pleasure, and would also give an opportunity for off-licenses to reopen (many seem to have been driven out of business by the convenience of supermarket drink) with the regeneration on high streets and jobs that creates.  It has to be a winning formula.
 
Sincerely
 
Hugo
 
Dr Hugo Minney
Minney.org
28 Edlingham Rd, Durham DH1 5YS
Minney.org is a limited company registered in England number 6287126. VAT Registration Number 916 0444 43
Mobile:  07786 961837
 
email:    hugo@minney.org
 
see:       http://www.minney.org

 

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