Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

There are a number of things I want to say about section 20. I will put them in context first. I was Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform in a previous life and was responsible for intoxicating liquor policy before the Department of Health ever got involved in it. I had to deal with issues such as happy hours, the promotional selling of alcohol and cafe bars. If one names it, I have been there. I remember in the other House proposing cafe bars and everybody, even including the Labour Party and the Green Party, descended on me saying it was a foolish idea. The reason I and the commission chaired by Gordon Holmes, who was from Limerick, proposed cafe bars was to change attitudes to alcohol in Ireland so that one did not have to go into a pub to get a beer but could go and have a pizza and a beer. Things have changed since. Some of the barriers that existed then have changed. The culture has changed and now there are pubs turning themselves into restaurants because there is no profitability or viability unless they serve food. That is a dramatic change in the ten-year or 15-year period we are talking about. Perhaps the smoking ban and drink-driving legislation played its part in all of those things. They are real phenomena.

This Bill has three broad thrusts, namely, minimum unit pricing, control on advertising and the invisibility of alcohol displays under section 20. I will ask the House to reflect on what we have heard from the Minister today. We should be evidence-based in all of this. Let nobody be under any illusion - the unit price of alcohol stipulated in the Bill will only affect the cheapest of beers. It will not affect the price of spirits and wine.