Politicians yesterday criticised ministers' plans to continue to push licensing proposals that, research suggests, will not cut alcohol-related violence.
Politicians yesterday criticised ministers' plans to continue to push licensing proposals that, research suggests, will not cut alcohol-related violence.
Following an article in The Herald, Richard Baker, Labour's justice spokesman, called for the Scottish Government to rein in their plans and announced he will be writing to manufacturers of drinks, such as Buckfast, named in the study.
The new research into violent young offenders, conducted over a 30-year period, indicates that ministers' proposals to raise the legal age and increase the cost of alcohol will not work.
The research, by Bill McKinlay, governor of Barlinnie prison, and academics at Glasgow Caledonian, also found that glass bottles used for alcoholic products associated with youth disorder were increasingly being used as weapons.
Mr Baker said: "The SNP's alcohol plans are in disarray. Rather than listening to Labour's plans for Alcohol Treatment and Testing Orders which can help tackle the behaviour of these individuals, they instead want to press ahead with half-baked plans to stop 20-year-olds from buying a bottle of wine from an off-licence.
"In the light of this research that clearly finds that glass bottles have become a weapon of choice for most of these young offenders I will be writing to drinks manufacturers named in the study to ask them to package their products in plastic rather than glass containers on a voluntary basis."
