Pete Robinson: Now they're after your 'Vertical Drinkers'

Public wrath over the appalling death of Garry Newlove should not even be directed towards the supermarkets and off-licences who supply young teens with cheap booze. After all these alcohol-fuelled, murdering thugs were only 15 and 16 years old. The real culprits are the parents of these feral gangs together with a society which places so much importance in its minorities that it creates an underclass of 'no-hopers' within it's own majority population.

But the media-induced image sustained in Joe Public's imagination remains that of our weekend no-go areas, the town-centre streets running with vomit, urine and blood come tipping out time, as disgracefully behaved teenagers and twenty-somethings brawl untidily from kebab house to pizza parlour. In most towns this is probably far from reality and drunkenness offences have actually fallen by around two thirds over the past 25 years. However people see it on TV so it must be true, and licensees are to blame.

The last thing pubs need right now is more knee-jerk legislation but when a chief constable calls for the drinking age to be raised to 21 this indicates there is a serious problem to be considered. While it's unlikely such a daft idea will ever make it to the statute books there is an army of pen-pushers arriving at work this morning whose sole purpose is to dream up new ways of taming 'irresponsible' landlords by binding their premises in red tape.

With that in mind their latest target is "vertical drinking", the alleged removal of chairs and tables so that customers will sink more pints when they are standing up. Last week the Times ran a scathing editorial blaming vertical drinking as one of the root causes of alcohol-induced street violence, and anti-social landlords for promoting it.

The vultures of officialdom are already descending to curb this practice. Perth and Kinross council has set new rules dictating the percentage of drinking customers who must remain seated in pubs and plans to employ a number of 'licensing standards officers' to enforce the new regulations, ultimately hitting pubs through their licence.

Health officials and police are demanding more tables and chairs in the pubs of Preston, Lancashire, to cut down on so-called "vertical drinking" violence. They claim the trend leads to fights as people are jostled and drinks are spilled in crowded establishments, saying "When people are standing in a bar they tend to drink more alcohol and the problem with that is that the more people binge drink the more likely they are to be involved in alcohol related injury or crime."

Personally I've never seen any evidence of this. Pubs have always traditionally catered for standing drinkers, at one time charging lower prices for vertically-consumed ale. Many people, myself included, prefer to stand for at least part of a pub visit. It makes for easier 'mingling' and is generally more sociable. I'd also be inclined to believe standing customers remain more sober.

Anyone with a back problem will tell you standing is also more comfortable in many cases.

So be warned. If this thing has the anticipated domino effect you may be forced to cram your bar areas with unnecessary additional furniture, and turn away customers when you exceed your prescribed 'vertical quota' of drinkers. Don't be surprised to see the Elf 'n Safety making pubs bolt down their chairs and stools, or even fit seat-belts to prevent the risk of "gravitational causation injury".

The authorities would do better concerning themselves with the street's 'horizontal drinkers'.