Alcohol Concern Cymru Survey Discredited

I recently ran a survey on this blog on support for minimum pricing of alcohol, the results are above with a firm 70% against it.

Curmudgeon ran a similar pole a few ago, although his results were 80% against the minimum price for alcohol.

So what happened today? Well fake charity Alcohol Concern Cymru published the results of THEIR poll which allowed them to claim that 77% of Welsh publicans agreed with minimum pricing. Although what they should have stated is that 77% of Welsh publicans who were questioned by their researchers agreed with minimum pricing. Although since it has emerged that they asked one publican 3 times about the survey this does throw into doubt the survey findings.

One Cardiff Publican wrote on my Facebook wall today when I posted about the ACC survey,

"Haha! They phoned me for this one, load of rubbish! In fact, they tried to phone me three times which really throws into doubt their findings... did they ask 600 landlords? or 200 landlords 3 times? idiots...


And lets be honest, you ask most landlords who are currently fighting bankrupcy and are getting smashed by brewery prices "are supermarket prices fair and ballenced" and they're going to say no... I think she told me I was the first person to disagree


That in itself tells me it's crap because I shouldn't be disagreeing with her, she shouldn't have an opinion! it's a survey!"


Hmm so that pretty much discredits the ACC survey, added to that they are unable to provide any publicans who are willing to go on the record to publicly support minimum pricing, every publican I have spoken to is against the measure, seeing it as another excuse for the Health Lobby and the neo-prohibitionists to increase the price of alcohol.
Alcohol sales are already falling, binge drinking is falling, and beer sales are down. Going against the free market and installing a minimum price for alcohol will do nothing to stem the tide of pub closures.
Having our taxes wasted by fake charities such as Alcohol Concern Cymru to produce worthless surveys in order to placate their political masters in Cardiff Bay is just another waste of public money. The minimum price will effect small-scale cidermakers throughout the UK - have a read of the Save our Scrumpy campaign. Once we give into the neo-prohibitionists and let them set the price of drinks where will this end?

As there is congestion on our roads, why don't we bring in minimum pricing for cars? A stupid idea? Yes, but that is exactly what is being planned for alcohol. Think about it.