Blog o’ Beer

DRINKERS will face late night ‘alco-tax’ under a Conservative government in a bid to crack down on Britain’s binge-drinking culture.
The Conservatives also plan to increase taxes on super-strength beer, cider and alcopops to stop teenagers getting “very drunk quickly and cheaply”.

A four-pack of super-strength lager would rise by £1.33 and a large bottle of alcopop would increase by £1.50, shadow home secretary Chris Grayling said.

He told the Conservative party conference in Manchester the tax rises would not hit “responsible drinkers”.

He said: “The ordinary pint in the pub will not be affected and there will be exemptions for some local traditional products.
But we’ll call time on the drinks that fuel antisocial behaviour.”

Daily Express

To put it simply. The Conservatives are saying that they will slap more tax on super-strength beer, cider and alcopops. I have a few worries about this. How strong does a beer have to be to be “super-strength”? Is this going to affect perfectly normal ciders that perfectly sensible people like drinking? And…well… I dont care too much about alcopops… There are comments about some local traditional products being exempt but how do small businesses go about proving they should be exempt?

Surely this is just another tax on a stressed out population who just want to have a drink!

This is all against the back drop of Conservatives not following their own ban on expensive alcohol during the conference. David Cameron being the latest person to be caught out (see left!)

MailOnline