ALMOST half of under-age drinkers stopped by police in West Lothian rate as having a drink problem, on scales normally used for assessing adults, a new study is set to reveal.

A third of the young people had got into fights when drunk, a quarter had unplanned sex, a third had been shouting and screaming in the street and 12% had fallen asleep in the street.

Under a pilot scheme, police in several West Lothian towns escorted 100 under-16s found drunk in the street to police stations and contacted their parents.

They were also spoken to by trained alcohol counsellors and a researcher conducted the Fast Alcohol Screening Test with each child. This is a four question screening tool used by GPs and A&E departments to identify hazardous and harmful drinkers. Encouragingly, a few months after the meeting with the counsellor, most reported that their behaviour had improved.

The figures will be included in a report to be published next month and are likely to feed into the controversy over the government's proposed ban on off-licence alcohol sales for under-21s. That policy was rejected by the Scottish Parliament, but endorsed at the SNP's party conference last week, although 130 delegates dissented.

The Scottish Government has indicated it still wants to bring revised plans before parliament in a bill. But it may also reappear as a purely local measure imposed by licensing boards.

Those arguing for the legislation cite the "success" of a pilot scheme in Armadale, West Lothian, where shops agreed to refuse to sell alcohol to under-21s after 4pm on Fridays and Saturdays. The scheme was credited with a 60% drop in calls to police about antisocial crimes such as vandalism, and a reduction in the number of actual offences, including assaults.

But the pilot remains controversial. The Coalition Against Raising the Drinking Age in Scotland (CARDAS) says the six-week project was too short to be meaningful, while assumptions about its impact were unscientific - as it ran at the same time as other anti-social behaviour initiatives in the area.

Evidence for the success of the Armadale pilot was also questioned by Professor Sheila Bird, vice-president of the Royal Statistical Society, last month. She said it was wrong for the Government to highlight a 60% fall in serious assaults when the numbers dropped from five to two. "That is statistically insignifigant," she said.

But Chief Inspector James Baird of Lothian and Borders police says of the pilot, "I know it worked in the short term."

He added that a voluntary ban on selling alcohol to under-21s at weekends had gradually been overturned because vendors who worked for chain stores did not have the autonomy to take action which might affect sales.

Over the few weeks of the trial, Baird insists that police had found "a marked drop in the incidence of anti-social behaviour. Other people were visiting the shops who wouldn't usually go because they were put off."

Other measures were being tried at the time which Baird accepted had an effect on lowering the number of assaults, but he said it was clear the ban had contributed. "Anti-social behaviour calls went down during the six weeks of the trial and they went up again directly after it stopped.

"Police officers on the street saw young people who would normally be drunk at that time and they appeared to be sober," he said.

Would it work if the Government brought it back as a local measure in problem areas? "It would depend on the local area," said Baird. "Our young people are quite territorial. When they couldn't buy a drink in Armadale, they didn't seem to go into Bathgate. But that wouldn't be the case in all areas."

However, Tom French, who represents Cardas, disagrees that targeting the young could be effective and argues that it is counter productive. "There is no evidence that it reduces binge drinking. If you look at the US where a number of states have an age limit of 21, underage drinking and binge drinking have actually gone up. This may be because it becomes forbidden fruit and it seems more exciting."

He said the pilot studies showed little evidence of any effect except for a tiny drop in vandalism which was "statistically insignificant".

French called for a range of measures including more education, better funding of leisure facilities for young people, enforcing existing laws more effectively and for a ban on cut-price alcohol and tour companies which specialized in pub crawl tours for students. Better ID, he said, would also ensure a drop in underage drinking.

Rachel Seabrook of the Institute of Alcohol Studies in London is also critical of the limitations of figures relating to the off-sales ban, and says the Armadale scheme was too short to provide useful evidence. "We would welcome some more, longer term studies" she said.

She added that there was also little research to demonstrate that more education, as proposed by Cardas, would prove useful.

"There is really not much evidence to support the idea that alcohol education makes any difference to drinking behaviour. Availability and price are much more significant."

SNP MSP Michael Matheson, who represents Falkirk West - where the idea was trialed in some areas - is keen to press ahead and has little time for objections.

"I would like to see this brought back to Parliament in a bill. When I knock on doors, 80% of people support it. We had a 28% reduction in breaches of the peace and a 40% reduction in calls to the police during our trial."

He is impatient with those who oppose the measure. "They talk about enforcing the laws we already have and education programmers in schools. We have been doing that here for years and years. We need to take a more radical approach."

A spokesman for the Scottish Government said: "Alcohol misuse costs Scotland over £2.25bn every year. It's causing problems for our health service, our criminal justice system and it's undermining our economy "Raising the off-sales purchase age is just one of our suggestions aimed at for bringing about a wider cultural shift in Scotland's approach to alcohol. Other proposals include a minimum price for alcohol, a ban on irresponsible promotions and a social responsibility fee for some retailers.

"We are currently considering all the response to our con- sultation and expect to announce the way forward by the turn of the year."

Operation Floorwalk
Earlier this year, Lothian and Borders police assessed 100 under-16 drinkers in West Lothian towns. On the Fast Alcohol Screening Test, 48% were assessed as having "hazardous" drinking habits.

• 53% had been drinking alcohol by the age of 13 years.

• This had risen to 88% by the time they were 14 years of age.

• 13% admitted becoming unconscious through alcohol consumption
• 12% admitted to falling asleep outdoors because of their alcohol consumption
• 24% reported having unplanned sex after consuming alcohol
• 32% reported getting into a fight through alcohol consumption
• 22% admitted being assaulted after having consumed alcohol
• 32% reported shouting and screaming in the street through alcohol consumption.

• 74% of those surveyed reported that their drinking had decreased following Operation Floorwalk involvement, with a direct move to less frequent drinking and a change in drinking habits away from fortified wines, alcopops and spirits.