Alcohol: Fraser welcomes UK Government’s targeted action

Reports today state that the UK Government has confirmed it is to ban sales of alcohol below cost price, as well as reviewing the duty paid on some alcoholic products

Murdo Fraser MSP, Scottish Conservative Deputy Leader, said:

"This is a very welcome step from the UK Government, making good on the commitment in their coalition programme. These actions will see a ban on the sale of alcohol below cost price and will look at ways of using the tax and duty system to tackle the problem across the whole of the UK.

"Scottish Conservatives have been calling for this since the turn of the year as it is a much more effective way of tackling binge drinking than the SNP's discredited plans for indiscriminate blanket minimum pricing.

"We need innovative and workable solutions to tackle Scotland's drink problem and this is an excellent place to start."

p.13 of The Coalition: Our Programme for Government states:

We will ban the sale of alcohol below cost price.

We will review alcohol taxation and pricing to ensure it tackles binge drinking without unfairly penalising responsible drinkers, pubs and important local industries."

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