[MikeSz]

I was listening to someone the other day lambasting off-licenses as a whole, and as a Trading Standards Officer, very few people can lecture me on how difficult it is to have this process carried out.

The view being articulated to me was that “off-licenses didnt exist years ago” and “if you wanted a drink, you went to a pub - you want to stop the problems, stop booze being sold in off licenses”. It is I suppose true that the pub trade, for a number of reasons, is dieing on its feet and booze at off-licenses and supermarkets is getting cheaper and cheaper.

The pub offers many an advantage - firstly, its a reasonably controlled environment. People are contained, and as is the case when I first snuck in a pub at 17, there are usually people there to keep you in check. Its also a great industry - a traditional English pub which offer's fine ales, food and company is perhaps something to be cherished.

Playing devils advocate, I can see the point and the attraction. Though I like to get a bottle of wine if I am having people round of a weekend and taking Booze off everyone means that the masses get punished for the crimes of a few. Pubs are expensive so there would have to be a revised tax system to make going to pubs cheaper than drinking at home and consideration may also be offered for those drinks that would be unattractive to those wishing to use it as cheap rocket fuel on a street corner - a fine wine or champagne for instance.

Social contract theorists in the political sciences believe we voluntarily sacrifice some freedoms in order to acquire greater protections and structure in our society - is it perhaps then the case that we structure the consumption of alcohol to direct those who wish to consume it to such places that are suitable and surrender that little bit of personal freedom? Not a decision I would like to make but a thought worthy of mulling - perhaps over a pint in the pub