'Brown to outline new measures to combat drink abuse'

A radical package of measures to create a "cultural shift" away from the epidemic of binge drinking is being drawn up by Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Parents will be encouraged to educate their children in the dangers of drink under proposals discussed at a Downing Street summit. Ministers are also contemplating moves to raise the tax on the most potent beers and mixers associated with binge drinking by putting duty on units of alcohol. Brown is also being urged by Labour MPs to force supermarkets to raise the minimum price of drink to reduce the attraction of cheap alcohol. - Independent​

Gordon Brown is set to keep controversial 24-hour drinking laws despite announcing during his first weeks in office that he was personally reviewing their impact. The move to allow pubs and clubs to stay open later into the night has been widely blamed for contributing to a surge in binge drinking and alcohol-fuelled violence across England and Wales. The climbdown comes as ambulance services reported a record number of emergency calls on New Year's Eve. Crews in some areas responded to up to 37 per cent more calls than the year before. - Times​

Magnus Linklater writes in the Times that duty on alcohol should rise, and licensed premises more difficult to come by. A new, tougher regime would see "drink become more expensive, licences punitively hard to get, and pubs would be barred from alcohol promotion, and would revert to becoming drinking dens, rather than places of entertainment. Most important of all, society would be encouraged to turn its back on heavy drinking, just as it now frowns on smoking", says the columnist. - Times​

Police hunting an armed thief who shot a policewoman in the leg after terrorising pub staff in an "exceptionally violent" raid have arrested a man on a nearby railway line. Detectives are questioning him and a 40-year-old man, who was caught earlier, about the shooting on New Year's Eve. Both men are being held on suspicion of attempted murder outside the Hospital Inn at Bamber Bridge, near Preston, where two raiders in balaclavas seized a "significant" five-figure sum in takings after beating up the chef. - Guardian​