Let’s use an existing law to stop drinks firms targeting our children

DO you know what a rainbow is? Do you know that girls have been treated in the Sexual Assault Unit in the Rotunda Hospital in Dublin with the amount of alcohol in their systems that is normally found in the morgue?

Do you know what a Wild Thing is? Or a Rodeo? Do you know what MLDAs are? Do you know that a doctor in Dublin told the Dáil recently that he treated a 15-year-old girl who was in a deep coma within an hour of drinking half a bottle of neat vodka? Have you ever heard of a Skoal Bandit? Do you know the connection between all these things? I don't want to pretend it's a simple or straightforward relationship.

President McAleese has recently highlighted our peculiar relationship with alcohol. There's no doubt in my mind that she was perfectly right to do so, and that she did it in a thought-provoking way. I have equally no doubt that it is a multi-faceted issue.