Meeting of the Parliament 04 February 2016
As members are aware, the Scottish Government does not support the bill progressing to stage 2, and I note from its stage 1 report that the majority of the Health and Sport Committee agree with the Government. I welcome the detailed consideration of and report by the committee. Its conclusion that the bill should not progress to stage 2 is welcome. The committee has seen my response to its report.
I would like to thank Richard Simpson for raising the issues and for his huge commitment to the subject over the years. We welcome the intent behind the bill, because although we have seen some improvements in recent years, we know that we still have far to go.
I want to start by outlining the journey on which we have been. We recognised that the scale of alcohol-related harm in Scotland requires a bold response, so we did not shy away from making one. We have taken considerable and comprehensive action through our alcohol framework. The framework contains more than 40 measures; I will highlight some of them.
We introduced the quantity discount ban, which led to an estimated reduction of 2.6 per cent in alcohol sales. We legislated to ban irresponsible promotions, and we have made a record investment of more than £319 million since 2008. We introduced a lower drink-drive limit, we have improved substance misuse education through curriculum for excellence, and we have introduced a nationwide alcohol brief interventions programme, with more than 569,000 ABIs having been delivered to date.
The framework is aligned with World Health Organization priorities and is well regarded by people who work in the field here and internationally. In recognition of our approach to alcohol policy, the Global Alcohol Policy Alliance chose Scotland to host its conference last October. We welcomed representatives from more than 60 countries, who were keen to hear of the work that we had undertaken and to learn from our approaches.
As we have heard, some of Richard Simpson’s proposals relate to advertising. The conference last year provided me with an opportunity to meet a number of international experts. We recognise that advertising is one of the key areas in tackling alcohol-related harm, so we have since formed a network of experts from the conference to look at advertising and sponsorship. That work will feed into the next phase of the alcohol framework to inform our future approach. We therefore welcome the intention behind the advertising measures in the bill.
Members will be aware that part of control of advertising is reserved to Westminster. We have pressed the United Kingdom Government to do more in that area, but in the absence of co-operation we agree with the Health and Sport Committee that the time is right to give further consideration to regulation in Scotland of alcohol advertising and sponsorship. As I have outlined, that work is under way.