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Raise the legal drinking age to tackle Britain’s binge-drinking youth?

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15 April 2007

The legal drinking age should be raised to 21, according to columnist Jasper Gerard, in an article to be published this week in the latest edition of Public Policy Research, the Institute for Public Policy Research’s journal.

Gerard argues that the UK has ‘lost the plot’ when it comes to regulating alcohol. He proposes raising the drinking age to 21 or requiring 18-year-olds to carry smart cards which record how much they have drunk each night and restrict under-21s to three units of alcohol. He also recommends:

increasing the number of prosecutions and the level of fines on retailers selling alcohol to minors
increasing taxes on drinks targeted at young people, such as alcopops
restricting advertising of drinks aimed at youngsters
allowing 16 and 17-year-olds limited amounts of alcohol in pubs, bars and restaurants when consumed with a full meal and accompanied by someone over 21.

Jasper Gerard said:

“The adverse social effects of binge drinking are now so overwhelming that we need to practise tough love.

“By raising the age threshold it is at least possible that those in their early and mid teens will not see drink as something they will soon be allowed to do so therefore they might as well start doing it surreptitiously now. Instead they might come to see it as it should be: forbidden.

“Anyone who has come up against teenage psychology must admit that banning things can make them more attractive. No measure will stamp out youthful drinking. But we refuse to admit defeat in the war on drugs; should we not at least try to win the war on alcohol?

“Society is increasingly reluctant to tolerate passive smoking, so why passive boozing – which is what innocent people experience when a drunken, clunking fist attacks them on a Saturday night?”

Notes to Editors:

Jasper Gerard is a journalist and columnist for the Observer and is available for interview via the ippr press office.

Alcohol-related conditions such as liver disease have doubled in less than a decade, to 262,844 a year, according to the Department of Health.

The number of people taken to Accident & Emergency with alcohol-related injuries has also doubled to 148,477 a year since 1997. This includes 8,299 under-18s, a 40 per cent increase in just three years.

There are 367,000 violent attacks a year caused by alcohol, and in some areas of Britain 30 per cent admit binge drinking in the last week (prior to being surveyed).

Alcohol Concern reports that in 2005 more than one in five 11-year-olds admitted they drank, and the amount they drank had doubled since 1990 to 10.5 units a week. By the age of 12, drinkers start to outnumber non-drinkers.

The National Addiction Centre found 65 per cent of pupils were aged 13 to 14 when they had their first drink without parental knowledge.

A 2002 survey for the Department of Health of children aged 11 to 15 found 62 per cent were already drinking; and that 52 per cent of 15-year-olds in England and 56 per cent in Scotland drank weekly.
Full list of contents in this issue of PPR: http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/toc/newe/13/4

Other articles include:
Making Sense of David Cameron, Alan Finlayson, Swansea University
Fair Rules: Rethinking fairness, Nick Pearce, ippr
Public perceptions of fairness, Miranda Lewis, ippr
Why do Liberal Democrats oppose the Child Trust Fund? Stuart White, Oxford University
From the polls, James Morris, Opinion Leader Research
Legalize it? How to solve Afghanistan’s drug problem, Anne Applebaum, Washington Post
Is there a future for the family? Göran Therborn, University of Cambridge

Hard copies are available upon request. Copies of the different essays are available in PDF form. Articles can be edited and republished with the permission and approval by ippr and the authors.

Contact:

Richard Darlington, ippr media manager, 020 7470 6177 / 07738 320 645 / r.darlington@ippr.org

Matt Jackson, ippr senior media officer, 020 7339 0007 / 07753 719 289 / m.jackson@ippr.org