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All articles in this issue:
Politicians call for drug policy reforms
Towards UNGASS 2016
Public Health (Alcohol) Bill 2015
Minimum unit pricing for alcohol: what will it really mean?
Preventing alcohol-related harm: what communities can do
First national youth strategy launched
Regulating sponsorship by alcohol companies of major sporting events
Community Alcohol Response and Engagement
Methadone-maintained patients in primary care
Alcohol conference and training seminar
Minimum unit pricing for alcohol: what will it really mean?
by Jean Long

What the European Court of Justice’s Advocate General actually said was that MUP for alcohol is legal ‘on condition that it shows that the measure chosen presents additional advantages or fewer disadvantages by comparison with the alternative measure’, in this case, general taxation.

There is compelling international evidence that pricing is one of the most effective ways to reduce alcohol consumption and tackle alcohol-related harm. The World Health Organization (WHO) has made it clear that there is ‘indisputable evidence that the price of alcohol matters’:2 if the price of alcohol goes up, alcohol consumption and its related harm goes down.  An increase in the price of alcohol through taxation is a general pricing intervention that will reduce alcohol consumption among all drinkers equally and decrease its related harms.

However, MUP is a targeted measure, designed to reduce alcohol consumption among heavy drinkers and harmful drinkers (such as binge drinkers). Cheap alcohol products are favoured by the heaviest drinkers, who generally seek to get as much alcohol as they can for as little money as possible and are most at risk of alcohol-related illnesses and death.  In addition, young people, who generally have the least disposable income but the highest prevalence of binge drinking, buy cheap alcohol. An MUP policy stops alcohol being sold at very low prices in the off-trade, particularly supermarkets, where alcohol is frequently used as a ‘loss leader’ and sold below cost.

MUP is a ‘floor price’, beneath which alcohol cannot legally be sold, and is based on the amount of alcohol in a product, measured in grammes. One standard drink in Ireland contains 10 grammes of alcohol and an MUP would apply per standard drink. Under an MUP policy of one euro per standard drink,

  • a bottle of spirits could not be sold for less than €21,
  • a bottle of wine could not be sold for less than €7, and
  • a pint of beer could not be sold for less than €2.

The evidence for the benefits of MUP can already be seen in Canada. For example, in British Columbia a 10 per cent increase in the MUP was associated with a 32 per cent fall in wholly alcohol-related deaths, while it also led to reductions in alcohol-related hospital admissions and crime, particularly alcohol-related traffic offences and crimes against the person.3

In 2013 the Sheffield Alcohol Research Group (SARG) adapted the Sheffield pricing model for alcohol to Ireland in order to appraise the potential impact of different pricing policies.4 In the following example from this appraisal, MUP is compared to general taxation.

  • For a €1 MUP policy, the estimated per-drinker-reduction in alcohol consumption for the overall population is estimated at 8.8 per cent and equated to an average annual reduction of 57.2 standard drinks per drinker per year. As this is a targeted pricing policy, high-risk drinkers have larger estimated reductions in alcohol consumption as a result of an MUP policy than increasing-risk or low-risk drinkers. For example, the estimated reductions in consumption for a €1 MUP are 15.1 per cent for high-risk drinkers, 7.2 per cent for increasing-risk drinkers and 3.1 per cent for low-risk drinkers.
  • The introduction of a 10 per cent (tax) increase on the price of all types of alcohol (cheap and expensive) would decrease alcohol consumption for all drinkers by 5–6% and would affect low-risk, increasing-risk and high-risk drinkers equally.

The Scottish Court of Session has already considered this matter and is of the view that taxation is ‘likely to be less effective in achieving the legitimate aims which the minimum pricing measures pursue’.5  Ireland’s MUP model also demonstrates that MUP has additional advantages over a 10 per cent general tax increase on alcohol.

(Jean Long and Brian Cummins)

 

1 The Scotch Whisky Association and Others v The Lord Advocate and The Advocate General for Scotland 2015. http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=166846&pageIndex=0&doclang=en&mode=req&dir=&occ=first&part=1&cid=210514

2 World Health Organization Europe (2009) Evidence for the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of interventions to reduce alcohol-related harm. http://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0020/43319/E92823.pdf

3 Stockwell T and Thomas G (2013) Is alcohol too cheap in the UK? The case for setting a Minimum Unit Price for alcohol. An Institute of Alcohol Studies report. http://www.ias.org.uk/uploads/pdf/News%20stories/iasreport-thomas-stockwell-april2013.pdf

4 Angus C, Meng Y, Ally A, Holmes J and Brennan A (2014) Model-based appraisal of minimum unit pricing for alcohol in the Republic of Ireland. Sheffield: ScHARR, University of Sheffield. http://www.drugsandalcohol.ie/23904/

5 Petition for judicial review by Scotch Whisky Association & others http://www.scotland-judiciary.org.uk/9/1040/Petition-for-Judicial-Review-by-Scotch-Whisky-Association-And-Others

 

 



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