My Lords, my noble friend will no doubt be relieved to hear that I will not ask as many questions as did the noble Baroness, Lady Smith. I think that we have perfect symmetry here because I wish to ask my noble friend why he is not going further today and why minimum unit pricing appears to be only half on the table.
The Government’s response to the consultation acknowledged that there might be unintended consequences of minimum unit pricing. This nostrum seems to be becoming increasingly prevalent. What process is now involved? We have this form of pricing, which clearly is half a loaf, but what is the Home Office doing in terms of further research? We have robust Canadian research, which many of us have seen over the past few months. I have the relevant brief in front of me. It states:
“All 10 Canadian provinces have some form of minimum alcohol pricing applied to liquor store and/or bar and restaurant sales … The Centre for Addictions Research of BC at the University of Victoria has collaborated with five other research agencies in Canada, USA and the UK to evaluate minimum pricing impacts on health and safety. Six studies have been conducted which demonstrate impacts of increased minimum prices on level of consumption and alcohol-related harms including deaths, hospital admissions and crimes. The results support the predictions of the Sheffield Alcohol Policy Model and suggest that estimated benefits are larger than the model predictions”.
It is interesting that all the Canadian evidence seems to imply that the Sheffield model is rather conservative in its estimate of the health and social benefits arising from minimum unit pricing.
It is interesting that the Government seem to have parked this matter. I very much hope that the Minister will describe what next steps will be taken to introduce something rather more robust than what we have before us today. How on earth will officials in the Home Office assess what the unintended consequences will be? It seems to me a very circular argument. There may be unintended consequences but surely, if the evidence appears robust, the way to deal with that is to go forward on a trial or sunset-clause basis, see what the impact is and then make adjustments accordingly rather than just talking about unspecified unintended consequences. I take the point about the Scottish legal challenge but that is a timing issue in terms of seeing whether or not that will bear fruit for the complainants.
I very much hope that the Minister will give us a little bit more of a window on the future as opposed to this rather cautious approach that we have at present.