Alcohol Duties

Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

Many public health officials, for many years, have criticised the system of alcohol taxation, particularly the EU’s system of taxation. Now that we have left the EU, we are free to set our own law in this area. Given the criticisms from the World Health Organization and many other think tanks, we can now set taxation based on the volume of alcohol.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

My Lords, I welcome that the duty will be related to the strength of alcohol. However, the Budget included a dozen references to wine, just as the Government were boasting that the biggest benefit of the New Zealand trade deal was cheaper New Zealand wine. This duty freeze, as we have heard, will cost £3 billion to the Exchequer over five years—money that could have been used for treatment services and for public health, since we know that deaths and illnesses will go up. It seems to me that the Government have an alcohol problem. They are scared to increase prices for the sake of all our health and are uncaring about the problems that this measure brings in its wake. Can this Health Minister go to his colleagues in the Treasury and try to educate them as to what they should be doing?

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

The noble Baroness is being a little unfair in her comments. These reforms were based on the advice of many public health officials, including the World Health Organization as well as a number of think tanks, which said that it was about time that we linked taxation to the volume of alcohol in drinks in the hope that we can encourage and incentivise manufacturers to lower alcohol content and to produce more low-alcohol and alcohol-free drinks. I am not sure whether noble Lords would accept such reformulated drinks, but it is important that we push this from a public health perspective.