Labour ex-ministers back SNP on drink

Published on Sunday 29 November 2009 22:44

TWO former Labour health ministers have fiercely criticised their party's leadership in Scotland for opposing the introduction of minimum pricing for alcohol.

Malcolm Chisholm, the Labour MSP for Edinburgh North and Leith, has been joined by his predecessor as health minister, Professor Susan Deacon, in calling for a change of heart over the policy.

They have both backed the SNP's apparently doomed bid to introduce a minimum price of probably 40p per unit, as the central plank of a series of measures in the Alcohol Bill to tackle Scotland's love affair with drink.

Most public health experts have backed minimum pricing as the best way to tackle drinking. However, many believe it is a blunt instrument which will only punish responsible drinkers, tax the poor and increase the profits of large supermarkets.

Labour's opposition to the measure was reported in The Scotsman last Thursday on the day the bill was formally unveiled. Criticism of the stance by two senior party figures is a blow to Iain Gray as Scottish leader of the party.

Mr Chisholm, who recently criticised his party's opposition to the release of the Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, expressed his support for the proposal in a letter to the Royal College of Physicians. He wrote: "I believe that price is a key element and I am persuaded by the arguments in favour of minimum pricing."

Ms Deacon, who stood down as an MSP at the last election, added: "I think minimum pricing is the right way to go. There's work to be done to work out precisely what legislation could and should look like, but I would like to see parties coming together – particularly those who say they support measures on minimum pricing – to actually come up with the right arrangement through due process in the parliament."

She went on: "Frankly, the Labour Party in Scotland has ended up in the wrong place for the wrong reasons on this issue."

Labour's decision to block the measure has effectively killed it off since the Conservatives and Lib Dems, whose UK leadership supports minimum pricing, have said they will vote against it in Holyrood because of damage it will do to the whisky industry.

Labour have accepted the link between price and the problem with alcohol, and have set up a commission to investigate the matter further.

Health secretary Nicola Sturgeon insisted that minimum pricing would save lives. She said: "Two out of three Labour health ministers during the eight years of the previous Lab/Lib Executive now support minimum pricing, which is extremely welcome, and dem-onstrates the breadth of support for the policy across Scotland.

"The issue is, or should be, above party politics, just as the smoking ban was. The priority is improving the public health of Scotland – and minimum pricing is a practical and evidence-led approach which tackles the problem of alcohol misuse by targeting cheap, high-strength beers and ciders."

But Mr Gray said yesterday that there was not a gulf between his party's position and the former ministers. He pointed out that there were still unanswered questions on the legality of minimum pricing and that the SNP had refused to publish advice it had received on the matter.

"We accept the link between price and consumption," he said. "That is why we have set up a commission to look at it."