With the spectre of a Christmas cut-back looming, I’ve been preparing for Bob Cratchit style celebrations this year. Another coal on the fire? You wish. Gives me another use for all those Royal Wedding supplements though.
Not everyone in Manchester has succumbed to my Scrooge In The City sensibilities, however. Party invites are dropping on my doormat even faster than those nasty red reminder letters. Looks like the busiest Christmas season for years. Requiring not only a post-party detox – but a pre-tox detox to cleanse my liver in preparation.
Well, at least that’s one thing they can never take away from us – Manchester’s party spirit.
Or so I thought. Until news broke this week that we could become the first city in the country to outlaw cheap booze.
Apparently, the draft by-law would ban selling alcohol for less than 50p a unit – putting a bottle of wine at £4.50 and a two-litre bottle of cider at £5.50. Town Hall chiefs reckon it’s for our own good – potentially slashing alcohol-related hospital admissions by 5,000 a year.
What next – taxing take-aways to curb coronaries? Thank you city elders, for your patronising concern. I might take it seriously if I hadn’t seen many a councillor doddering drunk out of city centre dos.
Maybe they think it’s ok to get sloshed on free champagne – but not if you get your booze from the bargain bin.
As a girl who grew up in the ladette generation, I’ve enjoyed my fair share of cut-price booze. They didn’t call our local 10p-a-shot bar Bonkers for nothing. Of course, I’m far more sensible these days.
But I do still like the occasional tipple and I don’t want to remortgage my two-up-two-down to get one.
Not that I’m saying Manchester doesn’t have a booze problem – as public health experts predict our penchant for getting pickled could kill 38,000 in the region within a decade.
I just find it insulting beyond belief that the council think the best solution is to price people out of a pint. As though the only problem boozers are those on the breadline. Waitrose wine drinkers are just as much of a burden to the NHS – the only difference being they will be able to afford to carry on drinking, while those on a budget won’t.
At best this draft by-law is insulting to those of us who enjoy alcohol in moderation every now and then. At worst, it’s a shoddy attempt to solve the deeper-seated drinking problems in the city.
As if slapping a few extra quid on a bottle of cider is going to get rid of the reason that some people in the region are turning to the bottle in the first place. Alcohol dependence in some of the city’s most deprived wards is a symptom of far more serious social problems – unemployment and lack of aspiration. But tackling the root causes would take too much effort. Better hit us where it hurts, in our wallets.
Protest is best on the street, not the screen
SURPRISING how easy it is to mouth off in cyberspace. So thanks to the online commentators on last week’s column who reckon my determination to march with the protesting students tomorrow is futile.
Apparently, I should stick to nail appointments like a good girl – because, they say, street protests never accomplish anything. No, sitting at home in your Y-fronts typing pro-Tory tosh is much more productive.
It would make me laugh if our city didn’t have such a fine campaigning tradition. You couldn’t imagine the Suffragettes thinking ‘oh stuff it, perhaps a nice letter would be better’.
Sadly, Britain is now a nation of bloggers. Caustic commentators without the courage to reveal their names.
For the sake of our education system, I hope there’s thousands more people prepared to get off Facebook and show their faces in public at tomorrow’s protests.
Kate’s style is just so Middle of the road
A CROCODILE’S dangly bits would hold no fear for me if I’m A Celeb jungle exile meant I could escape the Royal wedding. Since ‘Wills’ proposed to Waity Katy (I know, the suspense was keeping me awake too) they might as well rename BBC News 24 The Wills and Kate Show. Bored as I am, two things move me beyond mild irritation.
First, that engagement ring. A symbol of the most doom-stricken wedding of modern history? What a lovely thought.
But freakier than that is Mediocre Middleton’s rise to style guru status. As the £349 blue engagement dress she wore has spawned a supermarket knock-off. Whatever next – twinsets and pearls at Tesco?
I’ve seen more style savvy on The Royle Family. Let the wedding take over the airwaves if it must – but not our wardrobes.
I'm over the moon to see Gillian swoon
VINDICATION at last for those who have always thought diminutive diet gremlin Gillian McKeith was nuttier than the health bars she flogs.
Karma’s really come to kick her in the butt after years spent terrifying fatties into submission on You Are What You Eat. Now the healthy food harridan has been exposed on I’m A Celebrity as being scared of absolutely everything – except publicity.
She was hardly a walking advert for her meagre meal regimes as she struggled to operate the controls on that forklift truck. Maybe if you actually ate something you might be able to work it, you muppet.
As for the hand-to-the-brow fainting – I can hear a career in panto calling.
Now, there are those decrying her as an embarrassment to womanhood. I’m not buying that – we disowned her years ago, when she made TV out of making us feel bad about ourselves. She’s got more in common with the slipperiest jungle inhabitants than the rest of the female race. Hopefully, she’ll soon slither back into the undergrowth of Z-list obscurity she came from.
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Helen, This is one of the best pieces of journalism i have read in many a year !.
Putting the price of the beer / booze isnt going to stop the health or social problems in Manchester !.
Congrastulations on telling it exactly how it is !.
Regards - Ray
I agree that the booze culture in this country is sympotmatic of far more serious social problems but having watched 'Coppers' last night I think that the police would argue that stopping bars selling shots at 50p a throw would certainly not do any harm. Simple economics, if you have £20 for a night out and alcohol is £2.00 a drink then your probably not going to get into a state where you are puking in the streets and starting trouble, at 50p a shot it's going to lead nowhere else!
I would also argue that the people that would be hardest hit by these price rises, i.e. teenagers, are more inclined to take advantage of these offers and end up behaving in a way they never would sober!
p.s. I doubt many of the "Waitrose wine drinkers" are bundled into the back of a meat wagon or ambulance on a weekly basis.
"Party invites are dropping on my doormat even faster than those nasty red reminder letters"
so for you, you get an invite about once every seven years
It is not cheap - The councils will have spent £thousands already..
"exile meant I could escape the Royal wedding"
"Bored as I am"
I will continue to write on the subject in the Media, just so I can actually be a hypocryte as I type.
Helen Tither...ding dong!
Great article Helen
What next council officals in the check out line in your supermarket going through your shopping for unhealty chocolate bars
Dont laugh if the power crazed councils get away with the booze tax they will stop at nothing to increase their controlling powers over people and I thought councils were elected to serve the people not dictate and tell them how to run their lives.
I'm suprised you didn't try and blame conservatives for this hairbrained scheme being introduced by our Labour Council, or for the incredibly lax alchohol licencing laws as supported for the last 14yrs by the Labour Party. I am sure if you had tried you could have got it in there somewhere.
It cannot be that cheap of a stunt....the Head of Stockport Council is being paid a huge salary to draft this by-law/piece of illegal nonsense.As it is Pantomime season I can only assume he was chosen to undertake this task,his background is in Public Housing,but not Public Houses as we understand the term.
It would be nice if the middle classes in this country were to protest things like cutting disability benefits, or the rent increase in social housing; things that have disasterous effect on the lives of real, hard working, struggling people. The people who fight the wars for this country and empty the garbage. It is hard to be sympathetic - even as a mature student heavily in debt as I study for a degree around a full time, low paid job with a family to support - if these sudden pseudo revolutionaries got off their behinds before they were directly affected by this draconian approach to government.
The fact of the matter is, nothing that is currently going on is given much thought (or very much weight in the MEN) unless it affects the middle class. When it was cutting child benefits for those so rich as to not even need it, the MEN was right there, talking to over privilidged mumsy's in Cheshire as they bleated about how unfair it all is. Now it is student finance and suddenly everybody is Che Guevara.
The fact is, as I posted in response to Angela Epsteins vomit inducing piece about her poor wittle Sam and how he might be deprived of a year getting 'life experience' with all the other rich kids, puking their way around the globe on mummy and daddies credit card last night (it wasnt published for some reason..hmmmm....). Well, as I said, for working class people, a university education has and always will be routinely beyond reach for most. Those of us who do eventually break through the educational class barrier know that the debt we incur is just one moreon top of a mountain of debt we will be saddled with from the day we are born to the day we die.
But then again.....wait a minute..........If I get a degree and therefore the potential to earn more in a year than my parents earned in ten; well, I will be happy to pay it back at a tiny percentage per month. If I earn more than 24k per year, I wont be complaining about paying back 18k at tiny incrememnts until i am dead. Why? Because it will be worth it to have a job which may be slightly more fullfilling than cold calling idiots from dawn till dusk and being insulted by blue rinse pensioners on reception for fun. It will be worth it to have a job that pays more than minimum wage and that I am terrified of losing because I have no discernable skills as yet because my school in Salford was more like a zoo where kids were kept in preparation for young Offenders isntitutions.
So, forgive me MEN and Ms Tither, if I dont sound very sympathetic to you or Ms Epstein. I, like all members of the actual working class (not those who say - I'm working class, mummy was a school teacher and grandaddy was a miner) have bigger fish to fry. Well, not fish, economy fish fingers mostly. What are you having for dinner tonight helen?
Wil you publish this opinion Ed? Or will it disappear like the last one? I am on my short lunch break writing this. It would be nice comment on thicolumn. Cheers.
only thing a price hike like this will encourage the white van beer runs to neighbouring counties that dont have the stupid by-laws
I agree there are p**s heads out there causing trouble by drinking too much but they are in the minority so instead of making sensible people suffer get the police to beat the senseless scum with batons & pepper spray then lock them up for 6 weeks then finally send them to the front line in Afganistan
What a breath of fresh air Helen`s comments on the booze increases are ! At last, someone talking sense. Price control is NEVER an answer. It just causes more misery and some people will make cuts on other more essential items in order to still be able to buy alcohol. And how right you are, Helen, when you make the point that this sort of screwy legislation will not affect those better off ,who will still be able to enjoy their tipple. When will these legislators in ivory towers ever descend into the real world?
Is it any wonder that most people are cynical about those in power?
Put this with the peanut story. What does it take to stop people killing themselves. We have all been there done that.
before the breathalyser. I drank 8 pints had a car crash,was helped by the police in a story I would not like to elaborate.
I think the difference is we learned individually and collectively. I never drank more than 2 pints after that,now I don't drive.
It took a long time to sink in, but it is not just 8 pints now. It is 8 pints after loads of vodka,cider,rum,whatever else they can get down their neck cheaply.
omg! helen! whats wrong with you! this is one of the best opinions i've ever read!
thank you for telling it how it is! it will not solve the problems that town hall chiefs think it will.
you should have gone on to say that if thats if town hall chiefs think raising the price of alcohol solves this sort of problem. then maybe they should also drop their wages down to a more realistic level to save their councils money.
say maybe £25k a year minimum for everyone. even chief exec's!
hahaha! same mentality!
i dont think its fair for the ones who do not go out with the intension to cause trouble so way should the likes of myself and others that only go out one night a week be made to pay for the p--s heads that do cause the problems ,maybe one answer to it would be to make the ones that go to a/e pay for their treatment and charged with being drunk and disorderly that might make them be more responably till we do something to make they people involved realise that they atre not going to get away with it ,by the way it is not just the drink that is the proberlum it is drugs as well
Helen, thats better, giving all us cyber bigmouths a bit of stick back. I went on a student protest once even though Middleton Borough Council picked up my fees and gave me a grant towards my beer bill. Great fun hope you enjoy it. I would leave the Uggs at home, it could be wet underfoot, go in the fur tipped leather jobs. Protesting is quite physical so don't go overboard with the outerwear. Maybe some ski wear would be quite fetching. You need to dress just a little bit better than the average students so they understand that you are not one of them but are marching in solidarity. lets us know how you got on next week please. Ooops, excuse me, my Y-fronts are riding up a bit, thats better. Regards and looking forward to next week.
As though the only problem boozers are those on the breadline. Waitrose wine drinkers are just as much of a burden to the NHS
Any evidence to back this assertion? Or can you just make things up because it's a blog?
Firstly - what is proposed is against EU rules, so even if it comes in, it won't last long.
Secondly, listen to these same councillors moaning when the life and soul of the City is turned into a ghost town when folk go to other places to either buy their booze or have a night out.
I think these people in power forget they are elected to work on behalf of the people -not against them........ and these decision-makers with their finger on the pulse thought the Congestion Charge had a cat-in-hell's-chance of being voted in. lol
I agree with Helen - another example of the Nanny State not addressing the REAL problem but coming up with Mickey Mouse ideas and thinking they are doing something constructive.
Think again.
Helen! there is another bandwagon passing at around 21:30 on the 28th, maybe you can jump on that one as well.
Kindest Regards
Mark
Helen, you should be in power instead of these two faced, do good-ing naysayers!
Helen Tither for PM.
Pledge your allegiance right here!
Damn right Helen. Pricing people out of having a drink is nothing other then an attack on the worst off. It smacks of an authoritarian 'we know what is best for you' attitude ill becoming representatives of the general public. The politician standing for election stating alcohol is underpriced would quite rightly be seen as laughing stock.
.
You seem to miss the whole point. Young people are a law to themselves they follow the trend however daft it is.
I remember going to dance halls, coffee bars called Mogambo and Zanzibar, night clubs with strippers and top acts. They were shut down by the council. Madchester, or gunchester run by gangsters shut down by the police, but the latest trend defies all belief. I remember on holiday in Spain years ago I drank every night with a miner and his wife and two girls from Worthing. At 12 we went to bed.The girls went to a club.Next day they surfaced about noon grey faced. the last day they were so drunk they lifted them onto the coach. This year I was going down to breakfast at 8 these girls were just coming in. It does not make sense. The clubs close about 4.
The alcohol issue and the current prevailing problems is mainly due to the youth of today wanting to 'get out of me 'ed' who will spend and do what it takes to get 'bladdered'. They have a deluded opinion that it's 'cool!'. By raising the prices to extremes as proposed, it will be the responsible, sensible and mature people who will be penalised. A nightcap really does not compare with the excesses to which the offenders will consume. Perhaps the 'experts' should go the whole hog and issue us all with food rationing books to prevent obesity and other health problems?. Seriously, I would recommend we revert back to only supermarkets and public houses being permitted to serve and/or sell alcohol during restricted hours and not practically 24hrs which now seems to be case. Too many shops are advertising and selling alcohol so it's virtually on tap. If all else fails - those who urinate (or worse) in public areas, vomit etc., should be caught on camera and then made to return when sober to clean up and pay for their disgusting behaviour. If under 18 then their parents who obviously are too irresponsible to know or care what their child is upto!
The problem stems from the youth of today who think it's cool by 'getting bladdered', or 'out of me 'ed' and drinking anything and everything that wets their lips. Whoever thinks feeling really ill and hungover is a good thing says it all. They should be captured on camera in their deplorable state of drunkeness and more importantly, made to return to clean up their urine (or worse), vomit and/or discarded bottles or cans in their sober state. If under 18 then their parent(s) should be held responsible for their shameful actions. Reverting back to only supermarkets and pubs for the selling of alcohol during licensing hours should be adopted. The 'responsible' drinkers would then be able to continue and enjoy their tipple without paying exorbitant prices. Why should the majority suffer because of the minority.