New rules on alcohol pricing

James Brokenshire, crime reduction minister: We've announced today that alcohol can't be sold below the level of duty plus VAT.

It's the first time that this country has recognised the link between price, and also the harms of alcohol in terms of health and in terms of crime that gets played out on our streets.

It's a first step. We estimate that it will reduce crime by around 7000 incidents a year, 2000 of which are violent crimes and also reduce hospital attendances by around 1000.

We think it is significant to make this change. It’s a first step and it's also part of other steps we are taking around the issue of dealing with the Licensing Act, problem pubs, problem off-licences and also bearing down on criminality generally linked to alcohol.

We think it's important. We think it does make this clear statement between price and problem drinking. And we think it will start to have an impact on the way in which we relate to alcohol and actually starting to look at it in a way where we can treat it and consume it in a more socially responsible manner. Where, sadly, many people do consume it in a binge drinking way with the problems that this results in on our streets, on a Friday and a Saturday night.

Date: Thu Jan 20 14:51:06 GMT 2011