Professor Joe Barry:

We would all rather have cheap anything, but alcohol is not an ordinary commodity because it causes huge harm. Did I mention that I am chair of a local inner city drugs task force? It is a very deprived part of the country. There is a proliferation of off-licences. The difficulty with off-licences is that greater availability drives prices down. The evidence is that this causes harm. If marketers want to increase the sale of the product, they make it available. It is fairly straightforward. This is an unusual meeting today because quite a few industry people have differing views on the issues, but we are always consistently on the public health side and that is our brief. Obviously this is a health committee and the Government has decided to bring in this legislation and we want it brought in. I will let Ms Costello comment on the marketing.

Strict penalties for voluntary codes is a bit of an oxymoron. Voluntary codes mean voluntary. They do not work on this issue. It has been said that people will not understand grams, but they will understand grams if it is supplemented with information. The importance of grams is that epidemiological evidence on harm is linked to grams. I do not believe we should underestimate the intelligence of people. Obviously labelling and education on its own will not work, but this is part of a bigger package.