Tonight:
5°c
Cheers, David Cameron, for suggesting this week that families lighten up about drinking alcohol around their children. Perhaps his holiday reading includes The Three-Martini Family Vacation by American author and mother of two Christie Mellor. This book puts two fingers up to the do-gooders who claim parents should never drink in front of their children and advocates family cocktail soirees: "Parents! Re-learn the art of socialising!"
Cameron's message is timely. Most people, especially in the pinot grigio classes (and who doesn't count themselves in that number any more?), are caught between self-righteous anger and paranoid concern. They are annoyed that lately someone is always trying to limit their drinking. But they are also worried that we obviously do have a problem. Nobody wants a smaller glass. But nobody wants widespread alcoholism or for their teenagers to come home steaming either.
So what to do? Surely price is the obvious issue. Away from parental supervision, teenagers drink whatever they can afford. Aged 16, Thunderbird was my tipple of choice. Nowadays, a recent investigation of the overnight debris at my local playground suggests that pineapple Bacardi Breezers need a stealth tax.
Cameron is right to suggest that demonising the drink itself is not the solution. The US experience proves this. Over there, the issue of drinking and the family has become so extreme that a backlash is gaining momentum. And it is parents - not teens - who are turning to drink. An irreverent "Mommy Needs a Margarita" movement is thriving, complete with branded cocktail shakers and T-shirts.
Its motto? "Take the edge off your day." Online, you can find recipes for the perfect "momtini" (gin and vermouth-with an olive) and instructionson organising cocktail playdates-where you hand out highballs at the front door. Desperate times, it seems, call for large measures.
I am sure this isn't quite what Cameron is advocating. He wants a world where everyone gives their children a sip of champagne at weddings and where a 12-year-old can have a watered-down glass of wine with a meal. This is commendable - but isn't it the society we already have? I don't know anyone whose parents didn't drink in front of them and who didn't try sips when they were younger. But I do know a lot of people, myself included, who went a bit crazy once exposed to excessively large amounts of cheap alcohol.
Cameron's plain-speaking is appealing. But taking action by keeping the price of alcohol high is the only thing that will reduce teenage drunkenness. In the meantime, I await my invitation to a martini- laced playdate at Dave's Newquay beach shack. I have my Fifties-style Boden twinset ready. And I promise not to get (too) drunk.
Reader views (3)
No, Viv Groskop, raising drink prices is not the answer (you said yourself, teenagers go for the cheapest option - and they will find it). I think the answer is to limit the times when alcohol is sold. We now have supermarkets open from early morning until 10pm+ selling alcohol whenever anyone wishes to buy it - and many 14-year-old girls can and do pass as 18 (I did myself). Alcohol is everywhere, and now, as with cigarettes, we need to steer children away from it.
- Angela Guise, London, 01/08/2008 09:58
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I disagree. Why not enforce the existing age laws instead. Why should us oldies be forced to pay stupid prices for alcohol just to line Gordon Browns pockets because he's too timid to enforce existing laws. We oldies can and do drink responsibly and don't need patronising labour politico's micro managing our lives thank you very much.
- Ethan, nr Dole Farm, 31/07/2008 14:05
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I completely agree that cheap alcohol leads to binge drinking amongst teenagers (and indeed adults). My concern would be that if we raise the price of alcohol teenagers will look for substitutes i.e. drugs. When I was growing up most recreational drugs would have been unaffordable, however, these days the price of drugs seems to have come down.
The issue is a complex one and one that needs much more consideration than simply raising the price.
- Peet, N1, 31/07/2008 11:39
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