Concern over binge drinking
Binge drinking is currently a hot topic in Australia, occupying much media time and space.
Police in South Australia are calling for a review of licence conditions for pubs and clubs as they blame the proliferation of extended trading hours for the rise in binge drinking, writes John Harvey from Adelaide. Drug and alcohol services and business groups are also agitating for changes, advocating that more education and the implementation of preventative measures are urgently required to prevent further escalation.
The necessity for pubs and clubs to operate “around the clock” is being questioned and some groups are saying that licensed premises should offer subsidised transport for patrons, reminding them of their “duty of care” towards patrons.
Other suggestions made include increasing the prices of spirits, banning shot glasses and cocktail shooters, reducing tax on low-alcohol (light) beers and reconsidering raising the drinking age to 21 years.
Some commentators have noted that, as today’s youth start “a night out” at about 11pm – some hours later than their parents did, the industry is merely catering for a growing demand whilst adhering to current licensing regulations. Publicans, who say that knee-jerk measures will not solve a problem which has occupied governments in most developed countries for decades, are willing to participate in discussions but warn that simplistic solutions must be avoided.
Already, pubs and nightclubs that allow binge-drinking are being targeted by a police campaign which, for the first time, links individual street crimes with specific irresponsible licensed premises. Victims of crime and offenders are being quizzed by the police to determine where they have been drinking immediately before street incidents. With information thus gained, police and licensing authorities say that they will single out the problem venues and ensure compliance with responsible consumption laws.
Ian Horne, General Manager of Australian Hotels Association (SA Branch) said: “We must learn from past mistakes and guard against those who see this as an opportunity to impose their values on the broader community in the form of some level of prohibition.”
Children as young as eight are seeking help for excessive drug and alcohol use, the Youth affairs Council of South Australia reported in March. This is a new trend and some miss out on help as many agencies are funded only to help those aged 12 and over. The children concerned were suffering generally from family dysfunction, intergenerational disadvantages or came from homes where substance abuse was frequent. Alcohol and drugs, obtained via parents or friends, are consumed at parties, friends’ places or even at home.
On the other hand, Australian teenagers down 203 million alcoholic drinks per year, pouring AUD 112 million into government coffers, a submission from the University of Queensland researchers to the national inquiry into drinking laws states. Thus, the Commonwealth taxes teen drinkers six times more than it spends on fighting youth alcohol abuse. The study found that 35 percent of Australian adolescents aged from 13 to 17 drink alcohol, contributing AUD 105 annual drink tax per person. Beer and spirits were the favoured drinks of the males and pre-mixed drinks (RTDs) were the choice of the girls.
Although the proportion of drinkers in this age group has not changed, it is drinking twice as much as it was 20 years ago and the increase is directly linked to the proliferation of RTDs and a more relaxed attitude to under-age drinking.
“Is alcohol the most dangerous drug of all?” The cover story of Adelaide’s Advertiser Saturday Review on 8 March asked this question and featured seven interviews; with an alcoholic, a happy drinker, psychologist, publican, social drinker, teetotaller and young drinker. New guidelines, proposed recently by the National Health & Medical Research Council (NH&MRC) of a maximum of two standard drinks per day for both men and women have been condemned by the alcohol industry as “scientifically flawed, confusing, contradictory and ambiguous”. In a submission, the National Alcohol Beverage Industries Council (NABIC) points out that the dramatic reduction of the recommended daily limit could lead to a lack of credibility for the guidelines. NH&MRC maintains that the guidelines are designed to ensure that drinkers keep below a 1:100 risk of dying prematurely from the long-term effects of alcohol-related diseases but many commentators think that the new limits fail to consider the general population and existing cultural approaches to drinking alcohol.
In the light of the current debate, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said he wants to “scare the living daylight” out of teenagers in a desperate bid to stem Australia’s runaway epidemic of youth binge-drinking.
In March he launched an AUD 53 million anti-binge assault programme, featuring a barrage of hard-hitting advertisements, early intervention strategies for young people at risk and penalties for sporting clubs which fail to curb alcohol abuse. The advertising campaign would be helped by experience gained from successful anti-smoking and HIV/AIDS awareness programmes in recent years and would be discussed at the forthcoming 2020 Future Summit in Canberra. Already, the Prime Minister has spoken to the heads of all the country’s major sporting bodies to explore ways to stamp out a binge-drinking culture. As a result, a national responsible drinking code is to be introduced across all sporting organisations under an agreement finalised on March 14. The bodies have also guaranteed the involvement of high-profile sporting personalities in the government’s proposed hard-hitting advertising campaign.
Australia’s two largest brewers - Foster’s Group and Lion Nathan - will withdraw some higher alcohol drinks pitched at the youth market, it was announced on 20 March. The brewers said they would immediately cease production of a range of RTD products and reduce the alcohol content of some other lines but admitted that the items concerned amounted to only a small proportion of the rapidly growing RTD market. Drinks affected include McKenna Bourbon & Energy Drink, McKenna Bourbon & Coke, Inner Circle Rum & Cola (Lion Nathan) and Cougar Volt, Cougar Bourbon & Coke, Karloff Energy (Foster’s).
Both makers insisted that the energy RTDs and drinks with higher alcohol contents were targeted at the 18 to 30 year market. Federal health minister Nicola Roxon welcomed the brewers’ move and hoped that other companies would follow suit. Health and licensing authorities and retailers maintain that reducing the consumption of RTDs, particularly by underage drinkers, should be a primary aim of the current campaign.
