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Updated 12.01 pm
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Everyone’s talking about…
We’ll finally get a look at one of the most hotly contested pieces of legislation in a long time today. Health Minister Leo Varadkar is set to publish the Public Health (Alcohol) Bill with the aim of making it a criminal offence to advertise alcohol irresponsibly.
The debate surrounding the control of alcohol is so contentious that there are even arguments over who can be part of it. The Stop Out-Of-Control drinking campaign in many ways pushed a smart message, but the involvement of Diageo hampered the campaign from the get-go.
And it’s lobbying like this that makes the issue so contentious. With health campaigners, alcohol companies and publicans all pursuing different interests, decisions taken by government in this area are frequently criticised for listening too much to one side.
While a total ban on alcohol sponsorship effectively been ruled out, we can expect some kind of curtailment such as a ban on pitchside alcohol advertising. The banning of alcohol advertising near schools is also something that has been suggested.
Today, we’ll also get the actual numbers behind the proposed minimum alcohol pricing. In practice, we’ll know how much a bottle of wine will be.
This is, of course, in a country that already has the most expensive alcohol in the EU.
Expect to hear the term “missed opportunity” a lot today on this issue.
Meanwhile, the fallout from Monday’s RTÉ Investigates programme continues with gardaí now understood to be examining its content to see if action is needed.
The agenda
Inside Leinster House
It’s not quite inside Leinster House, but Fine Gael general election candidates will be gathering in the Royal Irish Academy, which is a short walk from the Oireachtas, this evening for a private meeting about the party’s election plans.
Frances Fitzgerald is chairing proceedings and the candidates will hear from the Taoiseach, his chief strategist Mark Mortell and the party’s director of elections, which is expected to be confirmed as MEP Brian Hayes.
What the others are saying
In case you missed it
Good day for…
The Social Democrats. Timing is sometimes everything and their private members’ motion to establish a body to investigate and prosecute corruption could not have been timed better.
TheJournal Politics / TwitterThe @SocDems talking about their plans for an Independent Anti-Corruption Agency. Timely given #rteinvestigates pic.twitter.com/Ao5fhAKcRD
— TheJournal Politics (@TJ_Politics) December 8, 2015
Bad day for…
Donald Trump. His proposal to ban Muslims from entering the US has been torn apart by people on all sides of the political spectrum and decried as both unconstitutional and fascist.
Sunny Hundal / TwitterWow, go Philadelphia Daily News! pic.twitter.com/3WeGkjNSqc
— Sunny Hundal (@sunny_hundal) December 8, 2015
On the Twitter machine
Hitting your rivals where it hurts, right in the taxes.
— TheJournal Politics (@TJ_Politics) December 8, 2015TheJournal Politics / Twitter
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This government could be as corrupt as you like and they’d still get voted back in, raise the price of booze though? Not a chance. They can’t be that stupid can they?
They’ll get voted back in as long as there isn’t a viable alternative, which there isn’t.
There is always an alternative to cronyism , back slapping and rhetoric.
What is that alternative, Paul? Shinners or the anti everything brigade? Great choices
A national government comprising of political parties and independents who have not enriched themselves and their cronies at the Irish Citizens expense maybe.
Sorry Paul, Tim is right on this one, the only viable alternative is SF or FF and neither are particularly palatable for the electorate. FG will certainly form a part of the next Govt. You’re talking in ideals which don’t work in the real world, I would be interested to know who you consider the political parties and independents would be keeping in mind we are 3 months from the election.
Actually tim and Ted, there are almost 20 political parties registered in the dail, that makes 20 one party alternatives and countless coalition alternatives!
Every single constituency has at least two independent candidates, and at least one fully independent (i.e. no ties to FF/FG/Lab/SF or the assorted leftwing or church groups). All it would take is for everyone to vote for an independent as their first choice and this would eliminate all party politics at a stroke. There may be a certain element of chaos at the start, but if all of these commit to government reform to remove whip politics and cronyism, and introduce two-term seats or equivalents, then we would have a non-SF led alternative.
There seems to be a desire to get rid of corruption associated with these parties, but a lack of belief. It just takes a single vote to introduce this belief.
Tim… if the “Anti Everything Brigade” initiate an Independent Anti- Corruption Agency. …. that’ll do for me. Little by little they can make changes. Unlike FG who promised all sorts of changes and dropped the lot once they got into power. And if you re-elect them, will you expect anything different next time? Of course you won’t.
@ Teddington: as SF are the most popular party with voters between 18-50 years of age, its a nonsense to say that they are ‘not palatable’ to the electorate.
sf ind will be the next government if not I hope ye are ready for more tax increases because with a national over 200 billion theres lot more taxing to be done.
People who vote this government in again are as stupid and irresponsible as people who put in fina fail for too long
Negetive answers are playing into to an incompent governments hands there are always alternatives to austerity loving governments
All minimum pricing will do is take money out of the family food budget ! If people have a drink problem minimum pricing will not sort it out !
We do have a problem with alcohol in Ireland but this is just another TAX
Raising the price of alcohol is just another way of taking more from the less well off. Those who can easily afford any sort of price hike need not worry. Should we expect any less from our right wing leaders?
The less well off will always have money for drink, fags, bookies #priorities
Ministers making it look like they are busy that’s all
Even if drink doubled in price people would still be getting hammered gonna take a lot more than cutting advertising of it ffs
Thats like benson and hedges saying you shouldn’t smoke….
Ha, never mind the demon drink, when you have to listen to the wife, when your home a weekend bit late. https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=786793751448067&id=100003523491089
It’s labels like “demon drink” and others that tarnish any discussion about responsible alcohol consumption. If he starting point is that every single adult that has any drink is a violent, psychotic alcoholic then the only people pushing the positive aspects (associated social activities, destressing etc..) will be the vested interests, who for obvious reasons, cannot be trusted here.
Minimum pricing only serves one purpose – to increase the tax take on a diminishing cost of off-licence sales. There is zero health, economical (for the consumer) or societal impact on introducing this, but the politicians (and the pub lobby) seem hell bent on pushing it through before the next election. That in itself, should send you a message.
We have the highest price in europe already and still have problems proving price isn’t a factor. This legislation will only affect those of us who drink responsibly and just is an election hand out to publicans.
Also since the scottish version still hasnt been ratified by the EU court of Justice as its very likely anti competitive this could be doomed to fail before it ever becomes law. I hope that someone takes the government to court on this and it gets put on hold until theres a verdict on the scottish version.
However min price of €1.70 for a beer or €8 for a bottle of wine has no impact on pub trade, where prices are much higher.
Sad really that the alcohol lobby can have such a strong influence on us if they are successful with their EU court case. It doesn’t bode well for the future.
The what’s in it for me party is at it again.
Nice one black market opportunity when this kicks in.
Increasingly we’re becoming very intolerant of alcohol consumption. It’s like we’re becoming Islamic. People want to get away from the image of Ireland being a great place to have a pint for some reason. Ireland has some of the best pubs in the world, we can be proud of that.
I think putting a minimum price on something goes against the free market and capitalism and everything we stand for in the west.
We already have some of the tightest rules regarding alcohol in the world. Shops can’t sell alcohol after 10pm. You can’t have a happy hour or have drinks promotions. You’re not allowed to drink in parks or beaches or on the street.
When will someone stand up and say – stop, you can’t keep on adding more and more regulations to everything and expect people of Ireland to feel liberated. People are starting to feel that we’re living under an repressive regime.
But alcohol (which remember is a drug just like any other) is the cause of huge societal and health issues in Ireland. We are obsessive drinkers on the whole. You OK with that?
I’m a big fan of freedom. Freedom of choices.
I agree Jack. Educate people and let them choose themselves what they want to do.Let people be responsible for their own health.
Every year the tax is increased on alcohol and amazingly people still binge drink but suddenly increasing the price even more is going to stop people binge drinking? I would call it insanity but clearly its not about stopping binge drinking, Its about tax revenue from alcohol.
Change our attitude to drink, as 2,500 Irish people are planning The 12 Pubs in Vegas on Facebook!!!
The government should back the social democrats bill on corruption. What I find interesting is that the DPP has been sitting on Moriarty now for years. Why? The statue of limitations runs out on Moriarty next year. Is it being deliberately held up. Should be a priority to have this dealt with immediately, if serious about corruption.
The very same people that tell us to pay this, pay that, do this, do that.
And yet they can break laws filmed on TV with no sanctions. Nothing. Nada.
It has come to the very sad point in a supposedly 1st world country where there are laws for the population and no laws for the well connected.
Our attitude to drink in deep within our DNA….This won’t even put a dent in our attitude. ..Indeed it could be counter productive.
What’s in it for me?
Another blindingly stupid idea which will hit the people with the least the most. You can pick up bottles of wine on the continent for €2-3 and they have less drink related problems then us. All this measure will do is take more money out of the food budget in households where there is an alcohol problem.
Whatever happened to choice and free will!
Nothing changed here so .
The soc dems only party full committing to anti corruption, I don’t see why we all accept that nobody can be held accountable. Also the report has said the soc dems mortgage crisis reform would have have Irish people out of arrears in 17 months. Really good stuff coming from them fair play.
Jonathan, The SocDems are bring backed fully by SF who themselves had similar anti-corruption legislation voted down by the government just last May. It’s most telling, however, that the Taoiseach is not backing the bill, as he has been handed a golden opportunity to back up his words on corruption with actions across the floor of the Dail.
Some say there’s no viable alternative to the treacherous taxing corrupted crowd we have now. I beg to differ. Let’s see what the election gives up.
Anyone but FG/LAB.
People will just go to the north to get drink then. This is going to result in off licences in border counties
Sure, because we all have a lot of outdoor activities available to us apart from socialising in the pub. Like drowning. Actually get fecked!
It says a lot about the caliber of our politicians when the most creative ideas of approaching a situation is get them to pay more.
Our current government and politicians existed to the death of autonomy. What a bunch of small minded, un-innovative and uncreative thinkers, I applaud you our leaders!!! And the rock we Perished on !!!
Varadaker caved into lobbying by the driks industry not to ban alcohol sponsorship of sports which has been proven to make a real differnce to drinking attitudes and consuption, the rest is window dressing and attempts by publicans to curb off licenses .
Gurry is giving Brutal a dirty look and Twenty Major has some froth on his upper lip…
Huh?
You can certainly name off those politicians with such confidence……well done on your political acumen…cough, cough.
Who is gurry?
You mean where is Gurry?
Ray 50 is a FG troll he is referring to Gerry Adam’s
So ben 50 cannot tell the difference between de’rossa and adams he should have went to specsavers.
It is Frank Ross, sorry about that. I’m definitely not a blueshirt.
That’s De Rossa, who actually was in the IRA.
A whole article covering many different issues, but every comment so far is about alcohol. But no, we’re definitely not obsessed with it!
How many publicans & councillors in this country are involved in the pub business? I’d say they love this idea so they can get more punters into their pubs to buy over priced pints.
Coffee can be as bad for you as drink for light drinkers, it comes to how much you take of anything???
Thdnbml
This is being sold to us as a “health measure”. This is “concern” from a government with one of the worst health services in the developed world. Wait until they start brewing and distilling their own and killing hundreds like it did when they increased the prices in some Asian countries. Bloody nanny state.
have your say