Mark Daniels is a long-standing columnist for The Publican and The Morning Advertiser, and in the past I’ve sometimes linked to his comments as a good example of common sense, particularly with regard to the smoking ban.
But I have to say his latest column is very wide of the mark. Minimum Pricing won’t make alcohol expensive, he says. Well, in a sense it won’t. Anyone on a comfortable income won’t regard £3.20 for a four-pack of Carling, or £4.50 for a bottle of red, or £12.60 for a bottle of Scotch, as “expensive” in any meaningful sense. Although I’ve occasionally taken advantage of prices below that level, it won’t make any difference to the amount of off-trade drinks I buy.
But there are a lot of people, who buy a lot of drinks priced well below that level. If your £9.99 bottle of vodka goes up to £12.60, it will be an overnight increase of over 25%. It may not make it “expensive” in middle-class terms, but it will make it a lot more expensive.
Large numbers of people on modest incomes will experience very substantial increases in the prices of their regular alcohol purchases.
Sadly this is yet another example of the arrogance and delusion of so many involved in the pub trade. Making cheap alcohol dearer won’t bring a single extra customer into your pubs. It might generate rather more customers for the bootleggers, though.
As Churchill once said, “an appeaser is someone who feeds the crocodile hoping it will eat him last”. Well, good luck with that one, Mark.
I think it to late. Minimum pricing or something is coming.
ReplyDeleteThose that think it does not affect them, well it won't yet but it will.
" If your £9.99 bottle of vodka goes up to £12.60, it will be an overnight increase of over 25%. "
ReplyDeleteSo you're saying anyone who wants to spent less than a tenner on a bottle of shit vodka will be priced out of not buying it because they couldn't afford the equivalent of the price of a pint on the way to the offie to buy it.
Pull the other one,old cock.
I agree it's a ludicrous price increase for all the wrong reasons except to make more cash for the posh boys in Government but moppers,topers and dipsos will always have the price of a pint in reserve.
And a loaf of bread going up from 80p to £1.00 would be something they could similarly take in their stride? It's all part of their regular shopping basket.
ReplyDelete£ 4.50 for a bottle of wine !
ReplyDeleteI buy decent Cotes du Rhone for under € 2 a bottle.
@anonymous.
ReplyDeleteYou'll like this then. A stonking Tempranillo at £3.59 a bottle that regularly beats outrageously expensive plonk in tasting sessions.
Perfect for Christmas quaffing, as they say.
Here's to us tightwads !
Cheers
http://www.aldi.co.uk/uk/html/product_range/product_range_18710.htm
I drink Lidl £3.59 Valdepenas. £4.22 represents a 17.5% increase and around £112 a year extra at 21 units a week. That's basic arithmetic - not a matter of opinion. Not much for me, but a lot for someone on the minimum wage. In the unlikely event of it becoming law, I'll be making my own for £1.30 a bottle. Others will be making it on a bigger scale and selling it to their neighbours; and others will be paying £1.80 a bottle in France and bringing it back. Once the price differential rises over 100%, it enables a larger, more commercial, black market, as both the transporter and the retailer can take a decent profit. That's what happened with rolling tobacco.
ReplyDeleteProfessor Pie-Tin: @anonymous.
ReplyDeleteYou'll like this then. A stonking Tempranillo at £3.59 a bottle that regularly beats outrageously expensive plonk in tasting sessions.
Perfect for Christmas quaffing, as they say.
Here's to us tightwads !
Cheers
http://www.aldi.co.uk/uk/html/product_range/product_range_18710.htm
Thank you very much indeed for bringing this to my attention. I went into Aldi and bought a bottle. I'm drinking it now.