Few of us would deny that teen binge(excessive) drinking leads to several unwanted community wide Consequences. Speeding, dangerous/aggresive behaviour,violence, property damage and the inevitable medical consequences.
If the purpose of alcopops tax was to reduce teenage binge drinking it failure was predictable simply because it sought to fix a symptom rather than the cause.

I have argued before that from a market perspective that discretionary items that have medical consequences should be priced to reflect the “real” cost (i.e. a tax that funds those medical consequences as in tobacco in the US). In this way it’s user pays you use a little you pay a little tax and vise versa. In this way the right to drink isn’t stopped.
The liquor industry lobbied that a liquor wide tax would affect sales…profits…and the perennial big stick, jobs. I reject this argument on the two grounds.
• First the status quo simple subsidises the company profits by taxing even non drinkers by making them pay for the predicable costs of their consumption of their products.
• Secondly and more fundamentally we as a race need to face the real costs our of our life style choices. Tragically it’s cheap to consume and prohibitive to pay for the consequences.
Notwithstanding this man has always had the need and will continue to find ways to alter their mental states by external means. Banning alcohol has proven to be impossible in a democratic world and merely gives rise to crime and shifts the problem to alternative. This in its self is suggestive of a more productive line of investigation.
In context of curbing teen drinking what do you think are some PRACTICAL ways in which we might do this?
Keep in mind people and their capacities vary greatly. School education, better parental role models and rearing techniques may be options but one need to consider how you would do this and what other options are there.

Dear examinator,

Teenage binge drinking is a problem
that's very close to my heart.

My nephew is a binge-drinker, causing
his parents, family, and us, a great deal of
heartache.

The two most difficult things appear to be,
having other outlets for entertainment
that are not alcohol related, and saying
no to peer pressure.

If we could have educational programs that
emphasised that it was allright to say, 'No,'
to alcohol. If teens could be educated to
encourage each other to have fun without
alcohol.

In my nephew's case what helped drive the message
home was meeting a couple of teens who had suffered
the consequences from binge drinking. This was
arranged through the local police.
It appeared to have an effect.

The other thing that my brother did (in desperation,
when nothing else worked)was re-locate his son
(with an older brother,
and his family,who kept an eye on him)to another city.
This got my nephew out of the company he was keeping.
And, out of the routine of the consistent binge-drinking.

It's working so far, but for how long, who knows?

examinator

As far as the alcopops are concerned, I think legislating to reduce their sugar content might have been more effective than taxing them. If they didn't taste so sweet, they would soon lose their appeal for younger teenagers, especially girls. Some of these drinks comprise almost 50% sugar.

Another good thread examinator thanks.
Because of my age and the habits of working men in the 50,s and 60,s I have lived with binge drinking.
Timber towns in the southern Highlands would have heaps of beer bottles as high as a car until the bottle collector called.
Dads arrived home drunk most nights and they passed it on to children.
Two people very well known to me are full on alcoholics, both interestingly tell the same story.
One is mid 40,s one mid 50,s, both tell of standing outside pubs at night looking in at dads laughing and joking with mates.
They both tell of wanting desperately to get old enough to join in, and that just watch each night became pure joy as they waited.
Seen proud mums and dads giving baby's in Nappy's a drink? and the visitors laugh and applauding?
We sew the seeds of this problem still, we must be the first to act to stop it.

Binge drinking (teen or otherwise) is a growing problem.

I suggest make the penalties for public drunkeness higher and possibly a user-pays approach to public hospital and other services when the result of gross stupidity and acute self-abuse. Do the same for drug users too.

Col

This is a problem that has to be owned by the whole of society.

As pointed out by Belly, most of us have contributed in some way to the growing levels of binge drinking, whether through our own drinking patterns, our taciturn acceptance of heavy drinking or even just through turning a blind eye to the developing situation. We have to work together and come up with creative collective solutions. Simplistic, blame-the-victim, user-pays penalties just won't cut it.

We're all part of the problem, and as examinator has quite correctly judged through the instigation of this discusssion, we all need to be part of the solution.