Maybe he'd be better off having a social worker hanging about on the booze aisle of supermarkets to help people stop drinking?
I can see it from both sides - if booze is cheaper then we buy more and drink more, if the price is higher makes us think twice about it. As for pub prices these are quite high anyway so raising the tax will damage pub drinkers on some nights but not places where they hand out freebies , buy 1 and get 1 free and so on - mainly in clubs and so on. We should charge these iresponsible drinkers who waste NHS resources for the use of Ambulances; that would serve them right for being out of control.