Curmudgeon News - August 2000

This month's items include:

  • Firms Told to Sack Heavy Drinkers
  • Hague the 14-Pint Man
  • Drink-Drivers Sent Back to Classroom
  • Council Licensing Powers Opposed
  • Could Virus Make You Fat?
  • Ton-up For Straw
  • Whisky Cake Driver Escapes Ban
  • Child-Free Demand Equal Rights
  • Cannabis Driving Risk May be Small
  • US Smokers Punished

Complete News Index


  • Firms Told to Sack Heavy Drinkers

    Employers are to be told to monitor their workers' drinking habits and to discipline and even sack those who over-indulge, according to instructions being issued to all companies by the Government. Every organisation will be expected to "develop an alcohol policy at work" and lay down strict rules on how much their staff can consume in a week. The code, drawn up by the Health and Safety Executive, says that employers should tell workers how the organisation expects them to limit their drinking. This includes drinking at night, in their own time. The Nanny State marches on - and we all know how little these so-called “sensible drinking” guidelines really allow you. I’m sure most employers will continue to ignore this unless employees’ drinking really impacts on their work performance, but more and more will start to use drinking habits as an excuse to weed out those who fail to conform to the corporate stereotype. And how long will it be before the mere fact of being a member of CAMRA means that many prospective employers won’t even look at you?

  • Hague the 14-Pint Man

    Conservative leader William Hague has admitted drinking up to 14 pints of beer a day as a teenager. In a move to dispel the notion that as a young man the only thing he imbibed to excess was political speeches, Mr Hague told GQ Magazine he used to drink a "horrifying" amount while working delivering soft drinks in South Yorkshire as a holiday job for his father’s firm, Hague Soft Drinks. He hastened to add he was the driver’s mate and not the driver. Perhaps he might improve his public standing if he got a few pints down him today rather than all that obsessional judo and exercise. After all, you can’t really imagine Blair, Straw, Mandelson and company drinking much apart from the odd small glass of Chardonnay, so he might gain a few votes from the non-Puritans amongst us. I always thought it was a pity that Kenneth Clarke never became Tory leader - now he’s a man who looks as though he enjoys the odd pint or six.

  • Drink-Drivers Sent Back to Classroom

    Drink-drive offenders face compulsory alcohol education and treatment courses under a shake-up of the motoring laws to be announced by ministers. Convicted motorists would be expected to attend an hour and a half class each week for between six to eight weeks in a course which would be designed to get them to face up to their problem drinking and prevent them reoffending. At present a small number of convicted drink-drivers pay to take such courses in return for a three-month deduction from their automatic 12-month driving ban. The AA gave a cautious welcome to the move, but a spokesman warned that if the classes were compulsory those attending might not have the same motivation. In the US some of the people sent for such reeducation simply turn up and spend the time playing cards. The trouble with this is that by no means all those convicted of drink-driving are in any sense problem drinkers. It makes no sense to lump together the person who has recorded an 85 mg BAC the morning after a few pints in the pub with the guy who's been stopped by police weaving around the road after consuming most of a bottle of Scotch, as the message they need to hear is completely different. And while offenders can be forced to attend courses, how can they be made to pay attention, let alone absorb and agree with the message?

  • Council Licensing Powers Opposed

    Government plans to transfer control of licensing to local authorities have met with strong opposition from many sections of the licensed trade. Tim Martin of Wetherspoon's said the plan would lead to more bureaucracy and delays, resulting in "higher prices, lower standards and less choice", while Shepherd Neame boss Stuart Neame said that if town halls controlled licensing, councillors would have the power to make pubs close earlier than at present if local residents complained about noise or nuisance. "Get on the wrong side of your neighbours and it won't be long before you haven't much of a business left," he warned. As I said in June's column, giving councils the power to control licensing is a recipe for disaster. Their decisions will be grossly inconsistent and politically motivated. If you doubt that, look at what has happened after the responsibility for setting speed limits was devolved to them. It could also give a dangerous hostage to fortune in the future, with anti-drink councillors seeking to limit the number of licences and close pubs down without good reason.

  • Could Virus Make You Fat?

    Researchers in the United States say some people's weight problems might be caused by a common cold virus. Experiments with animals suggest that AD-36, a virus which causes coughing, sneezing and cold-like symptoms, interferes with the normal process of absorbing food energy and converts far more of it into fat. Scientists from the University of Wisconsin injected chickens and mice with AD-36. Despite being fed the same amounts of food as a control group, the test subjects gained small amounts of extra weight. However, the animals were found to have put on large amounts of body fat, almost 2.5 times more than normal. Despite what the experts always say, it's clear from simple observation that some people eat and drink no more than others, and do the same amount of exercise, but put on much more weight. Possibly this could be an explanation. Atchoo!

  • Ton-up For Straw

    The car in which Home Secretary Jack Straw was travelling as a passenger to a Labour Party meeting was stopped by Avon and Somerset Police for travelling at 103 mph on the M5. However, it later emerged that no charges would be brought against the Special Branch officer who was driving. This certainly seems to be a case of one law for us and one law for them, particularly as it involved the cabinet minister responsible for law and order. A back-seat passenger might be unaware that a car was travelling at 80 mph, but if it was over 100 he surely would. However the point must be made that driving at 103 mph on a motorway is not necessarily dangerous in all circumstances (although clearly it is in many) and the driver in question probably knew what he was doing and was not taking any undue risks. It's a pity the police don't exercise the same discretion when dealing with the general public.

  • Whisky Cake Driver Escapes Ban

    A woman motorist who failed a breath test was spared a driving ban after magistrates accepted that it was because she had eaten three hefty slices of a whisky-soaked Christmas cake. Julie Wynne, 42, argued that she had only drunk two halves of lager on the night in question but had tucked into the cake, which was made to a traditional grandmother's recipe and contained half a bottle of malt whisky. The ruling at Nottingham was hailed as a legal precedent. While the cynic in me does wonder whether this was just a good excuse, you have to be thankful for small mercies in that a court for once has exercised a sense of proportion. It's a pity that their discretion to consider the circumstances before passing sentence in drink-driving cases is in general non-existent, leading to numerous cases of injustice.

  • Child-Free Demand Equal Rights

    "The Observer" reports a growing trend in America to stand up for the rights of those without dependent children.. A surge of fury at "family fascism" has led to the establishment of an organisation called "No Kidding!" which now has branches in 47 US cities. In the same week, a survey by "Management Today" in the UK reported that family-friendly policies in the workplace were causing resentment amongst childless staff who felt they were being disadvantaged. As more and more people choose not to have children, there is clearly a reaction setting in against the sentimental view that children should be given priority in everything. Currently there is a strong tide flowing in favour of greater access to pubs for children, but I suspect the demand for child-free drinking space will steadily grow. After all, at any given time, most adults do not have under-18 children, even if they might in the past or future. And it annoys me the way those who bang on about children in pubs seem to want kids allowed in all bars of all pubs all the time, rather than supporting a sensible choice between child-friendly and adults only pubs.

  • Cannabis Driving Risk May be Small

    Ministers are set to be embarrassed by government-funded research which shows that driving under the influence of drugs has a limited impact on accident risk. In the study, conducted by the Transport Research Laboratory, grade A cannabis specially imported from America was given to 15 regular users. The doped-up drivers were then put through four weeks of tests on driving simulators to gauge reaction times and awareness. Instead of proving that drug-taking while driving increased the risk of accidents, researchers found that the mellowing effects of cannabis made drivers more cautious and so less likely to drive dangerously. Both the findings and the methodology are highly dubious - it’s comparable with testing hardened drinkers, who would probably be able to drive considerably better after a few drinks than the population in general. Inattention rather than aggression is the cause of most road accidents, and everyone knows that cannabis slows you down and makes you dopey and dozy. Simulator tests are also notoriously inaccurate in predicting real-life behaviour on the roads. The risks associated with alcohol have been determined by research comparing the proportion of the whole driving population with certain levels of alcohol to the proportion involved in accidents, and surely the same should be done with cannabis and other illegal drugs.

  • US Smokers Punished

    Attempts to make American tobacco companies pay huge sums in damages will have the effect of costing smokers more money. Philip Morris, Liggett and RJ Reynolds have all announced increases in the wholesale price of their brands of 6 cents per pack which will translate as a retail price increase of 7-8 cents per pack. The companies all said that the price hikes were necessary to meet the cost of legal awards against them. The companies expect lost sales as a result of the price increases to be modest . A classic example of the law of unintended consequences, in that supposedly trying to help smokers ends up just making them suffer even more. And what will be the end result if tobacco remains a legal product, but the tobacco companies are forced into bankruptcy? It is likely to put the trade entirely in the hands of criminals, probably the same ones who make so much money from illegal drugs.

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