Vintners support responsible and safe sale of alcohol

I READ with dismay the headline on the front page of your newspaper (Jan 10 — “Sting catches one-third of pubs and off-licences selling drink to children”.

While it may not be the fault of the journalist in question, the headline is unfortunately misleading, and could give the impression that a third of all pubs are guilty of serving minors.

According to the article, the 12-month nationwide sting, the Test Purchasing of Alcohol Scheme, began in October 2010, and has targeted 119 premises with offences detected in 41 of them. The gardaí will tell you that they generally target premises where they have suspicions of illegal activity. The 41 cases relate, according to the article, to pubs and off-licences, despite the breakdown between both not being available, according to Gerry Kavanagh of the Garda Press Office.

Indeed, in an article in the Irish Examiner on December 8, 2011, Superintendent Con Cadogan outlined that 13 premises had been visited by gardaí in Cork as part of the Test Purchasing of Alcohol Scheme and that four premises had served alcohol to minors.

Not one of these premises was a pub. They were either shops with a liquor licence or off-licences. Any scheme that seeks to protect young people from alcohol-related harm has to be lauded by all those involved in the sale of alcohol. Indeed, it is our strongly held view that this scheme could have gone much further and that the minister should introduce a mandatory garda ID age card for all those over the age of 18. We are totally in favour of the safe and responsible sale of alcohol. However, we cannot accept inflammatory and misleading statements such as those printed in your edition and would ask that all the information be available and correct before statements such as these are published.

Padraig Cribben

CEO

Vintners’ Federation of Ireland