Having watched as much of the conference speech as I could stand, it came as no suprise that the teetotal Son of the Manse annouced plans to raise tax on the already overtaxed pub goer. This time the tax increase will pay for policing. Hang on a minute, we already pay enough in taxes to support the uniformed branch of the Labour Party, sorry Police force, together with the free-range park wardens known as PCSOs. If the police or the Government really wanted to clamp down on binge drinking then there is one easy law that could be enforced - it is an offence to serve anyone who is drunk, so why don't the police go around the City centres at night clamping down on the premises that are serving people that have already had too much to drink? It's already on the statute book so no further legislation would be needed. Of course the Police would object to this, after all it is too much like real policing and not inside the current safety zone they work in at the moment. Instead our deluded, unpopular and widely disliked Prime Minister announced a headline grabbing policy that will hit pubs and responsible drinkers in the pocket. Coincidently the British Beer and Pub Association today announced that they are stopping the "Axe the Tax" campaign on lowering beer duty. Looks like fake charity Alcohol Concern and their Government paymasters have scored a success on that front. Still look on the bright side, there are only 6 months left of this Government before the voters of this country give Gordon Brown a bloody nose at the polls, to add to his detached retina. The final 6 months will be messy, as the scorched earth policy of the bunker-dwelling Brown attempts to screw up this country even further.
Has anyone else noticed that Gordon Brown's health problems are similar to those caused by congenital syphilis? Delusions, blindness, temper tantrums, death of a still born child, sickness in other children etc. Looks like life in the Manse was a bit more interesting than once thought.
While I agree that there's plenty of tax on a pint of beer as it is, do you really think it's faesable [sp?] for cops to go into premises and having to decided who's had enough or not?
ReplyDeleteWould you like it if they came into the pub you were in? And what would happen to someone who's deemed to have had enough to drink - what would prevent him/ger from going to another pub/club to get served.
But what the police do at the moment is wait until the drunks are fighting in the street before making arrests. Surely prevention is better than cure?
ReplyDeleteI can remember when uniformed officers used to pop into city centre pubs, keeping an eye out for habitual criminals and underage drunks and even collecting the brown envelope for the 'donation' to the police widows and orphans fund. Surely a proactive approach to the city centre problems are needed and not another tax by a pub-hating government?