Binge drinking

AW Alva (Letters, 2 September) is naive to think that cutting hours in pubs and supermarkets for selling alcohol will solve the problem of “binge drinking”.

I am old enough to remember the restrictive licensing of the 1960s and 70s. I am therefore old enough to remember with a shudder the undignified scramble to get through enough booze before the dreaded 10pm closing on weekdays, and the rush to drive, no less, to a hotel a few miles away to get any kind of drink at all on a Sunday.

In short, if people are determined to get enough to drink, they will do so, regardless of any well meaning but piously ineffective restrictions.

Jim McDonald

Wallace Road

Dunblane