Opinion with Tim Martin, chairman of JD Wetherspoon
Time for some lateral drinking
As we all know, people have misbehaved when drinking for centuries. Shakespeare knew all about heavy drinking ('what three things does drink especially produce?') and Churchill was a famous boozer, drinking and smoking in his bed and his bath, while dictating notes to his secretary.
Since these chaps were recently voted by Britons as No.1 and No.2 in their list of heroes, we don't need pie-eyed celebrities at the Brit Awards and numerous paralytic sports stars to give us a clue as to our drinking culture.
But the big change that has wrong-footed the pub trade and media is that congregations of people coming out of pubs, and even dinner parties in quiet suburban streets, who indulge in loud and aggressive behaviour, are no longer socially acceptable in the community. People are getting better off as the decades go by, and want a higher standard of living, and will no longer tolerate wild and aggressive behaviour in public. This changed perception about what is acceptable behaviour is putting pressure on politicians, licensees and the police to create a more civilised approach to drinking and socialising generally.
However, the pub trade, or at least its main spokesmen and newspapers, have tended not to look at the big picture, but have engaged in a game of passing the buck. Instead of addressing the core cultural problem, the more or less unified trade response, a bit like the boy accused of misbehaving in class, has been to say 'it's not me, Sir, it's the supermarkets with their low prices'. This is true up to a point, since 90% of alcoholic drinks were consumed in pubs 30 years ago, but now it's only about 50%. However, by blaming supermarkets and their low prices the trade and trade media has painted itself into a corner.
The Government could only solve low prices in one way: by putting up Excise Duty, and that's what they did. We all know, and politicians and policemen know, that price is not the real issue. If it were, as Phil Dixon has said in the Morning Advertiser, the British Legion would be the epicentre of binge drinking. We also know that the French and Italians drink more than we do, and don't fall down in the street afterwards.
The correct approach, in my opinion, is for the trade to declare what is self-evidently the truth: binge drinking is a cultural issue and the correct solution is to raise awareness of this fact and to make it socially unacceptable to misbehave after a few pints, just as it's now unacceptable to drink and drive. If this message gets across, it certainly won't solve every problem, but it will create a backdrop in which licensees, the police and the majority of the public are on the same side. It would also ensure that police resources are not wasted on huge efforts to prevent 16 and 17-year-olds using pubs (which almost all parents did at that age, and now allow their children to do), thereby exacerbating the problem by creating a teenage vodka culture in our streets.
On a more practical level, so far as pubs are concerned, we try to ensure that pubwatch is set up by the police and licensees in every village, town and city in the country.
When they are run well, they work brilliantly, and create a unified front between the trade and the police, which helps to eradicate the binge drinking traits that benefit no one. Pubs have to move into the modern world and to engage in some lateral thinking.
Trying to force respectable citizens to pay more for their booze at supermarkets will alienate everyone, and only result in more trips to Calais, as well as duty rises that are a much higher percentage of costs for pubs than for supermarkets.
Contrary to belief, licensees and the police are on the front line in dealing with binge drinking, and a common solution based on changes of attitude, combined with the requirement for a universal pubwatch system, is the answer.
