Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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576. To ask the Minister for Health the policy direction being pursued in regard to a matter (details supplied); if his officials will be directed to support the pursuit and scope of this new work on alcohol beverage labelling; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24445/18]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy will be familiar with Government Policy aimed at combatting the misuse of alcohol, a key feature of which is the Public Health Alcohol Bill which contains a number of provisions including one on the health labelling of alcohol products and another on the regulation of advertising and marketing of alcohol.

At present under EU food labelling rules the amount of information that must be presented to the consumer on the labels of alcoholic drinks is less than that of other food products.  EU Regulation 1169/2011 on the provision of food information to consumers (FIC) provides an exemption for alcoholic beverages containing more than 1.2% by volume of alcohol from the obligation to list ingredients or provide a nutrition declaration, such as the energy value and the amounts of fat, saturates, carbohydrate, sugars, protein and salt contained in the product

The Regulation places an obligation on the European Commission to adopt a report addressing whether or not alcoholic beverages should be covered by the requirement to provide the list of ingredients and the nutrition declaration, and the reasons justifying possible exemptions.  This report was adopted by the EU Commission on 13 March 2017. In its conclusion it stated that as a first step current voluntary initiatives by industry should be allowed to develop further so as to provide a list of ingredients and nutrition declaration. The Commission invited industry to present a self-regulatory proposal that would cover the entire sector of alcoholic beverages.

The Commission would then assess the industry's proposal and if it was considered that the self-regulatory approach proposed by industry was unsatisfactory, the Commission would then launch an impact assessment to review further available options, in line with Better Regulation principles.

On the 12 March 2018, the alcoholic beverage industry submitted a self-regulatory proposal to the Commission which consisted of a joint self-regulatory proposal from the European alcoholic beverages sectors on the provision of nutrition and ingredients listing.  The proposal includes guiding principles and separate labelling proposals for each beverage sector, i.e. spirits drinks, wine, beer, cider and fruit wines.

The proposal does not contain a harmonised approach across all alcoholic beverage sectors and suggests that in certain cases some information could be provided “off label”, i.e. on websites or other electronic platforms. The matter is currently being considered by the Commission to determine if EU regulation will be proposed rather than the voluntary labelling programme.    

At a more global level, under the auspices of the Codex Alimentarius Commission, there are indications of some preliminary work being considered on alcohol beverage labelling.  The most recent meeting of the Codex Committee on Food Labelling (CCFL) took place in October 2017.

Following a discussion paper presented by the World Health Organisation, the Committee identified a number of areas for potential future work and included in the list was alcoholic beverages labelling.  A concern expressed was that similar overlapping work is underway in other international organisations.  The Committee, therefore, agreed that information would be sought from member countries, via a Circular Letter (still to issue), on current practices, issues in alcoholic beverages labelling and allergen labelling; and identify in Codex where provisions already exist and any potential further role for CCFL.

The CCFL agreed to develop a discussion paper on alcoholic beverages labelling.  This will be prepared by the Russian Federation with assistance from EU, Ghana, India and Senegal and future work will be subject to approval from the Codex Alimentarius Commission, at which Ireland will be represented.

My Department welcomes efforts at EU and other international levels to improve the requirements for the labelling of alcoholic beverages.  While such efforts may be in keeping with Ireland’s national policy on the consumption of alcoholic drinks, it will be some time before agreement on international proposals is reached.  In the interim, my Department will pursue the proposals already outlined in the Public Health (Alcohol) Bill, as I believe this is in the best interest of public health.

In terms of labelling of alcohol beverages, the Public Health (Alcohol) Bill reflects the work of Codex in this area.  The labelling provisions in the Bill will ensure that consumers can make informed choices about their drinking. 

The Bill provides for the following information on the label of an alcohol product:

- A warning to inform the public of the danger of alcohol consumption;

- A warning to inform the public of the danger of alcohol consumption when pregnant;

- A warning to inform the public of the direct link between alcohol and fatal cancers;

- The quantity of grams of alcohol contained in the product;

- The number of calories contained in the alcohol product; and

- Details of a HSE website providing information on alcohol and related harms.

Products sold in kegs or casks will have an accompanying document with the above information.  Licensed premises will have a notice with the warnings and website information as above and will confirm that a document noting the alcohol content and energy value of every product for sale in the premises is available on request.  The information will also be required to be on any website that sells alcohol online.  The aim is to provide consumers with information about alcohol products regardless of the manner of purchase, whether in a shop, public house, on-line, etc.