Police warning over underage drinking

POLICE are warning parents not to buy alcohol for their underage children after an increase in drunken incidents involving young girls.

Girls as young as 12 have been found “slumped and unresponsive” in streets and parks by wardens, police in the Forth Valley area said.

It is leaving them exposed to crime as they are often unaware of their surroundings. In one incident, a 15year-old girl collapsed in a park in Falkirk while drinking. She had to be treated by paramedics. And in Clackmannanshire, a 12-year-old girl was found unresponsive in a street by community wardens and had to be taken to Forth Valley Royal Hospital.

Officers said they had carried out test purchases and surveillance on several licensed premises in the area but found no evidence of sales to underage teenagers.

Chief Superintendent Davie Flynn said: “This isn’t about young people drinking a small amount of alcohol socially, it is about them drinking so much they are putting themselves at risk.

“It may well be done by parents with the best of intentions of teaching their children responsible drinking by giving them a couple of bottles of beer or alco pops for a party. But by the time their children get to the party, these have multiplied by everyone else adding to them and there can be rogue bottles of vodka.”

He asked parents to report any incidents of underage drinking to police.