Hansard

I thank the Scottish Government and the cabinet secretary for bringing the debate to the chamber. The motion is entitled “Scotland’s Relationship with Alcohol”, but the issue is about much more than that.

When I came to this country 30 years ago, I was shocked by Scotland’s relationship with alcohol—a relationship that cannot be found in any other country. Our attitude to alcohol is completely different from that in any other country, believe you me. Members have talked about countries that produce alcohol. France produces a lot of alcohol, but people in France do not drink the same way that we drink in Scotland. That is my first point, which is very important: Scotland’s relationship with alcohol is very different.

I would like to take that a bit further, because we have talked about Scotland’s relationship with alcohol for many years. I want to talk about what we as individuals can do about our relationship with people who have a problem with alcohol. Those people are among us. Sometimes, those people are us: sometimes, we have a problem with alcohol for one night or one week. We can have a problem at any time: when we are young or when we are older and feel a little bit isolated. We are all at risk.

A lot of my colleagues talk about education. This week, more than any week, we have been reminded that politicians, with all our knowledge, education and understanding, can still be caught up in problems with alcohol—God, a lot of politicians are caught up in them down in Westminster and even here in this Parliament.

The issue is not only about policies, although we have great policies here. The issue is not only the Government’s responsibility, or, as some have said, the responsibility of people who abuse alcohol—those who do not drink in moderation. I do not like the phrase “drinking in moderation.” For a lot of people in France and in Scotland—for people all over the world—there is no such thing as drinking in moderation. Some people cannot drink alcohol at all. We can blame them for the disturbances that they create and for the money that we have to spend on the NHS, or we can see what we can do ourselves, as individuals.

I revert to the point that this is a societal problem. We have a Government that has introduced and is doing a lot of fantastic things. However, as a society—as individuals—we need to change our attitude to not only alcohol but people who have an alcohol problem.

We cannot let this go. We are, far too often, the alcohol buddies—the drinking buddies—who facilitate somebody’s drinking. Sometimes, it is the contrary: we are the ones who end up in a bad state—in peril—after drinking alcohol because we have buddies around us who think that it is a good idea.

Members have talked about women, but I do not want to target women. What did we expect? Of course equality is coming and of course women have the same opportunities, including money wise—everybody has a lot more money in their pockets—so of course the problem will affect both genders. I am not sure whether the problem is worse for women than it is for men, because men are still drinking a lot, although women—especially young women—have decided to go from drinking alcopops to drinking spirits as well.

I wanted to start with those points, but I also want to talk about drink driving. I was on the Justice Committee when we introduced the new drink-driving limit. Of course we had to do that. I cannot understand why our country ended up with a drink-driving limit that was higher than that in countries that do not have the same problem with alcohol. One reason was that the issue was reserved to Westminster, but we managed to get that through, after some constructive negotiations with Westminster. I encourage the cabinet secretary and the minister to keep up that constructive dialogue with Westminster so that all the issues that we have not got the power to address here can still be addressed.

I am delighted that, because of the change to the drink-driving limit, in Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire and Moray, in my region of North East Scotland, the number of people caught driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol has fallen by 23 per cent. That has made a big difference,

However, the biggest difference in all this is that people have stopped drinking during the week. That is a fantastic change of attitude. I would call the drink-driving legislation that we brought forward drink-living legislation, because we have changed the way we live. We knew that that was important: in order to drive to work every morning, we decided to change the way we live.

If we can use ideas like that to change our attitude to alcohol, it will affect not only the people who have a problem with alcohol, because we all do to a certain extent, but even the people who do not drink. We need to understand that part of the population will have a problem with alcohol.

It is important to have a lower drink-driving limit for drivers other than drivers of cars. I have suggested that we could ask Westminster to have a lower limit than we have just now for lorry drivers and bus drivers. That is an important point.

People in England and Wales are drinking a lot less than we are. That applies especially to young people. Even though our young people are drinking less than they used to, they are still behind in terms of the consumption of alcohol in comparison with young people in Wales and England.

The Police Federation of England and Wales has called for the legal drink-driving limit in England and Wales to be in line with the limit in Scotland. It is good news that we are ground breaking and finding ways to address the issue.

Businesses have a responsibility as well. This February, I was delighted to see that the Albert Hotel in Peterhead, Aberdeenshire, had begun to stock an extensive range of alcohol-free beers and wine. That brings me back to what we can do. I was at the event hosted by Jim Eadie last night, with all those people who do fantastic work. I suggest that members go to see the photo exhibition and to Serenity cafe, the little cafe adjacent to the Parliament—it is just opposite the SNP headquarters—to see the fantastic work that has been done.

When the event finished last night, I came down to the bar in the Parliament, where there is an advertisement for a beverage called Hee Haw, which is a new alcohol-free lager—it is a fantastic name. I will tell everyone what really annoyed me. I asked the people behind the bar when they started selling it and how much they had sold. They started to sell it two days ago and I will let members guess how much has been drunk—hee haw, despite the sign being right in front of the bar. That is the problem. Despite all we do and all the regulation that we have—the Scottish Government is doing fantastically—if we do not do anything about this as individuals, the result will be hee haw.