Drink to me only....

Quite frankly, I am sick and tired of the media going on about 24-hour drinking, politicians criticising the new licensing regime, and the police, judges, now magistrates, airing strong fears about the anarchy that will inevitably follow extensions to current opening hours. It is not 24-hour drinking; premises had to apply for precisely the hours they wanted to open. All right, this may mean some who want to be open for 24 hours will have applied for that, but please don’t force people to assume that this will be the norm! It just won’t happen. I am very uncertain of the consequences of longer opening hours: presumably, if people want to go out and drink themselves senseless, they will continue to do so, although it will still be an offence to serve alcohol to someone who is drunk, continuing to place the job of assessing a person's condition squarely on the shoulders of licensees and their staff. And any decision to refuse to serve them will inevitably lead to indignance at best and violence at worst. Oh well, they can stock up during opening hours at the pub or an off-licence and then get as blotto as they like out of hours. The new legislation is not going to stop that and they can do it now! Critics have said that the priority should have been to get to the root of the culture, particularly among younger drinkers, not to be allowing outlets to sell alcohol for longer. I suppose that’s true. But if the police don’t like it, they can object to the grant of licences. If judges and magistrates don’t like it, why didn’t they or anyone else who doesn’t like it kick up a fuss at the consultation stage? The Licensing Act has been around for more than two years so why have they waited until now? And it survived the passage through Parliament, so why are they acting as if the whole thing is a big surprise? Come to think of it, these critics must have a pretty low opinion of us and assume that we’re just in the game to make as much moolah as possible and if the customers start collapsing around us, well, blind eyes will be turning like mongoosery. We’ll do our damnedest to ensure it won’t happen in our pub. Anyway, we only asked for an extra 30 minutes on Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings, so it will be very much business as usual. Paul G0tlg says in his latest blog: "…the way to stop binge drinking …… is for people to get a grip and take control of their own lives"... Yay to that! Oh, and good luck to whoever is given the job of getting people to do it! Whinge over.