Why SNP needs to grow up over the drinking age
It is a bit concerning that the SNP has been linked to a possible rise in the legal drinking age to age 21.
The SNP is certainly coming out with very confusing policies and plans regarding young people. On one hand it is campaigning for young people to be given the vote at age 16 but on the other hand is saying to young people that they are not old enough to decide if they wish to have an alcoholic beverage. On top of all this, the SNP also wants young people up to the age of 18 to have a named state guardian.
The SNP should decide once and for all what age constitutes adulthood. Alastair Macintyre,
Rosyth, Fife Raising the legal age for banning the sale of alcohol for consumption to 21 goes against the flow of all the social and legal responsibilities that are laid at the feet of our teenagers, from 16 onwards, by our Scottish Government.
The SNP has played its part in trying to lower the voting age to 16, an age when youngsters can leave home, get married, enter into a lawful civil partnership, consent to lawful sexual intercourse and join the Army with parental consent. At 17 they can give blood, at 18 stand for election as a local councillor, join the armed services without consent, buy cigarettes and tobacco and, at present, buy and consume alcohol. The list goes on.
If you can fight and die for your country at 18 years old, what right has the SNP to suggest a change in the law should take alcohol out of the reach of this age group? In any case, teenagers will access alcohol, somehow, somewhere, whatever the law says. Archie Mackinnon,
Glasgow My heart went out to Jim Thomson when reading of his daughter’s alcohol addiction and untimely death (Sunday, April 5). But he says his daughter began drinking excessively at the age of 17.
The article also mentions an increase in alcohol-related hospitalisation in the 15 to 24 age group. Bearing in mind this alcohol abuse by young folk below the current legal minimum age of 18, it would seem that raising the minimum age of consumption to 21 won’t necessarily solve our nation’s issues with alcohol.
David Syme, Paisley, Renfrewshire How good to hear health bosses are considering raising the legal age for buying alcohol to 21 to tackle bingedrinking. I’m sure if we did so we would save thousands of lives. It’s just what the doctor ordered.
D. F. Courtney, Weston-super-Mare After years of anything goes, we now seem to be entering a puritanical phase, with a vendetta against alcohol, confectionery, soft drinks and cigarettes. It was us that let the genie escape from the bottle – now we are trying to squeeze him back in!
Denis Bruce, Bishopbriggs, Glasgow