Minimum price for alcohol 'may not be legal'

Published on Thursday 11 February 2010 21:03

THE SNP has suffered another blow to its plans to impose a minimum price for alcohol after a Holyrood committee raised doubts about its legality.

The Scottish Government's plan

is the cornerstone of a raft of measures to tackle Scotland's drink problem. But yesterday a report by the parliament's subordinate legislation committee, which considers the competency and legality of bills, found that the proposal might break the law.

The committee insisted ministers would need to set the minimum price in the bill, something the SNP has resisted doing. The knock-back came a day after one of the academics from Sheffield University, on whose research the policy was predicated, admitted to the health committee there was no evidence to suggest that minimum pricing would curb alcohol consumption.

Telling MSPs that the world would be looking to Scotland to see how minimum pricing worked, Dr Petra Meier said: "The idea of modelling is you haven't introduced a policy, you're trying to project what is going to happen. It's like the weather forecast, you don't evaluate it afterwards, it's a model."

Yesterday, members of the subordinate legislation committee insisted that the government returns with further details in its bill or risk exposing the Scottish Parliament to legal action. Members complained privately about the "vagueness" of statements given to them by civil servants and ministers working on the legislation.

The committee report stated that a "complex assessment" will be needed to determine whether the proposal falls within the competence of the Scottish Parliament.