Rooney Anand, chief executive of pubs giant Greene King, yesterday admitted he had some sympathy for minimum alcohol pricing proposed by the Scottish Government as his business posted double-digit profit gains north of the border.

Rooney Anand, chief executive of pubs giant Greene King, yesterday admitted he had some sympathy for minimum alcohol pricing proposed by the Scottish Government as his business posted double-digit profit gains north of the border.

Anand told The Herald: "It is a tricky issue. You can argue from a health point of view that it is good, and from a choice and free market perspective it is yet more state intervention.

"I would like to see how that debate pans out before Belhaven issues a view or a policy. Genuinely I can see merits on both sides.

"If you are a parent or someone who makes a living selling alcohol you have to a have a guardianship attitude to how alcohol is supplied and how alcohol is used.

"Equally from a free market point of view it does smack of more state intervention and state interference."

Much of the drinks industry has been critical of the proposals from the minority Scottish National Party administration, which are intended to combat drink-related illness and public disorder.

Yesterday, Sir Ian Good, chairman of Famous Grouse and Highland Park distiller Edrington Group, used the group's annual report to describe the plan as "ill- conceived", claiming it could cost tens of thousands of jobs.

But last week chief medical officer Harry Burns, who was once agnostic, said he now backed the idea.

The Scottish Licensed Trade Association also likes the plan because it thinks it will help pubs compete better with the price-cutting strategy of many supermarkets.

Anand was in bullish mood yesterday after Greene King posted a pre-tax profit of £118.5m for the year ended May 3. This was a 15% drop on the year before but ahead of analysts' expectations.

Investors reacted by sending its shares up as much as 5.4% in early trading until they settled to closed up 12.25p, or 3%, at 422.25p.

The company's Scottish operation, Belhaven, had a particularly strong time as it recorded a 12.2% rise to £34.9m in earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation. This was on the back of revenue gains of 9.9% to £123.7m and stronger profit margins.

Like-for-like sales at Belhaven's 95-strong managed estate rose 5.4% driven by food like-for-like sales, which soared 16%. Food is now a quarter of total revenues at the division, up from 15% two years ago.

The company has re- developed seven pubs as food-focused Eating Inns, which drove much of the growth.

Anand said the move towards food was bringing more women and families into its pubs.

Belhaven's 230 tenanted pubs continued to face "challenging" conditions, the company said, but tenanted operating profits still rose 12.1%.

Belhaven Best has benefited from a television marketing campaign and grew volumes in a declining market.

Anand said: "The Scottish economy and certainly the pub and beer economy has held up more strongly than we expected and certainly more than for their English cousins."

But he warned that he was worried that pressure on public spending going into next year could damage Scottish consumer spending given the greater relative size of its public sector.

Rooney said Greene King, which runs 2500 pubs across the UK, could benefit from the current hot weather seen in much of the country.

"Good weather and sunny weather, and even in Scotland pretty hot weather, makes people thirsty and makes people sit outside and enjoy themselves."

Greene King, which in April raised £207.5m through a rights issue to acquire pubs from struggling rivals and buy back debt, last month bought 11 pubs from Punch Taverns, Britain's biggest pubs operator, but said it was in no rush to spend more.