Whingein' n Bingein'

Moral panic time - young people it seems are drinking themselves silly on cheap alcohol in public.

Well it's true - a bit.

We are a nation of bingers - as are most northern European countries. Try spending an interesting couple of hours in Finland at chucking out (and I mean that in many senses of the word) time on a Saturday night.

What to do about it? Well one thing would be to enforce the laws we already have and do it properly. The police should be policing licensed premises and ensuring they are not selling to underage drinkers - trading standards officers too. But it appears they don't have the time despite the bingeing problem being top of the media and public list of 'things to get rid of'.

Here's a new idea. Let 16 year-olds in to pubs and allow them to drink alcohol in moderate amounts. Pubs are safer environments in which to drink than local street corners or rec grounds after glugging down 12 pints of Stella or cheap cider. There is evidence (anecdotal at least) that pubs have become better managed since the reform of the licensing laws. It also means that the right-of-passage in to the pub moves down age-wise, a bit. 16 year olds can be supervised a little better and under 16's might find it a bit harder to get booze on account of looking younger, although I accept that lots of 14 year olds can look older if they try, but hey.

Go aggressively after businesses which sell to underage drinkers and take their licences away.

Why isn't this happening? Answers please.