Labour calls cease-fire on binge drinking

The Anti Christ

You seem to be trying to describe common sense. I thought it was a foregone conclusion that common sense doesn't work anymore. You can't have it all ways Dave.

TrevorsDen

Come come ... this is all about what new labour proudly touted as 'joined up government' back inn1997 (boy how long ago does that feel? Come back John Major all is forgiven.)
The chief Medical officer cautions against youth drinking - drinking in general - and the next day Labour retract all their 'binge' drinking laws!

'Simples!'

PC
"Shortly after, he melted to the floor in the manner of the Wicked Witch of the West"
The correct phrase is "he went down like a sack of whelks"

TGF UKIP

Nothing, absolutely nothing would do more to help the pub trade than a modification, or preferably total repeal, of the absurdly draconian anti-smoking laws.

Thes are laws that a sensible, non PC Tory Party would, of course, promise to re-visit. Unfortunately .............

Maria

i would say - are they mad but we all know the answer to that one. Bread and circuses I think is the appropriate response.

AndyinBrum

I'm not arguing its an issue, but people have been moaning about the passed out drunks in the street/station/bus stops since alcohol was invented.

Naomi Muse

Whatever happened to the old Dixon of Dock Green collar of 'Drunk and Disorderly'?

Anyone who cannot stand up and walk about has to be drunk and disorderly so where are the police on this, and, as far as your experience in Victoria Station is concerned where are the Transport Police?

We shouldn't have to walk through all of that slalom at all. National Rail should ban certain individuals from its premises, the police should charge people with being D&D and pubs and bars should be refusing to supply further drink to folks who are obviously overdone with it.

Common sense has escaped and cowardice has come in instead, methinks.

Naomi Muse

Exit common sense and common decency and enter cowardice and public disorder.

As all people lying about the worse the wear for drink, and certainly people vomiting after consuming even manly alcopops, are drunk and disorderly, why are they not being charged for it?

As to your ghastly slalom across Victoria Station, where were the police and the tranport police?

All binge drinkers who are not able to get themselves home without making a mess or bothering others should be done for being D&D and fined after a night in the cells. A few fines of £1k per incident would put a stop to it.

Chuck Unsworth

Hogarth.

Snowman

another chunk of the population likely to cast their votes for nuLabour.

john miller

Deep in the bowels of Number 10 is the Chief Coin Tosser - one of the many tossers there, but this one is in charge of The Coin.

The Coin is used to determine the government policy du jour. Having to issue a policy announcement every day takes a lot of resources and at least (in the old days) one sofa.

Now, the sofa has been thrown out and there are only two people presenting the Chief Coin Tosser with alternative policies of the day.

Hence the decision to announce urgent action on teen drinking yesterday and a relaxation of the intended bans on alcohol sales.

See also the move to sell tobacco products in plain wrappers and the cessation of that policy (h/t leg-iron).

JohnBUK

Look, the issue is to stop people behaving criminally. If their behaviour after drinking to excess is criminal then the police should do their job, arrest them, bring them to court the next day and, for once, the magistrates have the power to "hurt" the miscreants.
At the moment the bunch of lunatics masquerading as the government would rather punish EVERYONE via new laws or new taxes. After all we musn't be judgmental must we?

Is there any danger of anyone doing their job properly at any time?

Sam ARMSTRONG

This is northern European drinking culture, that's all. There's nothing abnormal per se in people behaving like this, they do so only because they are not properly controlled. If they had Police breathing down their necks they would simply remember their manners and stop. It's cold here, and we have a hard work ethic, and a long winter ahead, and not much to smile about on the news. People, if not controlled, are going to let off steam this way. It just needs to be Policed properly and diverted to non-public places.

Beer Moth

Hogarth indeed Chuck. It can't be long now before bear-baiting is brought back.

Yow Min Lye

New Labour is an illusion caused by lack of alcohol.

Nero

Bread [cheap booze] and circuses while [UK] burns.

That's Nulab caring and sharing. Staying in power while the dumbed down kidadults destroy themselves and poison the UK for the remaining sane people.

I travelled to London on Friday morning, and the train was full of empty cans, McWaste wrappers and smelled of alcohol soaked vomit. Charming, I thought.

Rhoda Klapp

We have laws against public drunkenness. Why not enforce them? Oh no, the lawmakers now would rather punish the innocent in order to enable the guilty.

The police should spoil the evening of public drunks (of whatever age and social class, binge-drinkers or no) by detaining those who are incapable for their own good (not imprison them, oh no) until they are able to take responsibility for themselves.

Steve John Tierney

Rubbish. It was a patently stupid idea and whether you feel personally put out by drunken behaviour or not, was shooting at entirely the wrong target. It's great that it was dumped. And it's rare I congratulate Labour on a policy move.

cityboozer

It's the same as the wider anti-social/criminal problem. The Powers That Should Be have withdrawn to their bunkers but have not returned to us the right (or the ownership interest) to fix the problem ourselves.

I have seen similar scenes in Victoria and other stations. How can it be allowed to go on at least three nights of the week (Thursday is London's favourite drinking day, presumably because people want to be paid for their hangovers) every week of the year, yet my home town's church hall cannot get a licence for alcohol at a dance or wedding more than one day a month?

Joined-up, my arse.

Dorothy Wilson

AndyinBrum: streets, stations and bus stops were in somewhat short supply when alcohol was first invented.

Nero: You don't have to travel on a train to see piles of fast food wrappers, drinks bottles and even beer cans. I live in a smallish village and the verges and hedgerows on our lanes are full of them. It seems people simply chuck this rubbish out of their cars. Currently, there is even a cooker in the ditch at the road out of the village that leads on to the Fosse Way.

It is all part of a culture - as is binge drinking - that preaches that "I" can do what suits me and two fingers to anyone else.

Bob Frost

I think it was bit naughty using a picture of Speaker Bercow's wife to illustrate the article..........

Stuart Beamish

If they were serious about controlling drinking they would stop supermarkets selling alcohol ~ However, I don't think Lord Sainsbury would like that.

Tiberius

Unfortunately I seem to have that effect on all attractive young women.

Chuck Unsworth

@ Beer Moth

PMQs is, of course, the overly sanitised NuLab version of Bear Baiting. Personally I'd like to see altogether more blood on the carpet.....

Marcher Baron

Instances of public drunkenness dropped significantly after the new licensing laws were introduced in WW1. The idea was to stop munitions workers handling explosives while under the influence, but it had a knock on effect throughout society. Labour needs to look at its own policies.

Verity

Chuck Unsworth - "Hogarth". My thought precisely. Gin Lane.

Except these people, the socialist slithering sleazoids currently in power, are creating this scenario intentionally. It's not a by-product. It was created with malice aforethought.

Why?

To gain more control, by more rules, of the group formerly known as "the electorate".

Britain's down the pan. Far, far, far worse than any other country in the West. Because the communists in Britain are the most vicious and the most thuggish and have the greatest hunger to control the lives of others. And the Brits, possibly due to so many generations of well-earned self-confidence, were not on their guard. They were not alert.

It happened so fast, it beggars belief.