Links for 9/6/06

• A clampdown on excessive drinking is at the heart of the biggest ever campaign to be launched by Wiltshire police force today.  "Think twice B4 getting trashed" is the message of the Operation XS campaign and each month for 7 months it will centre on a different aspect of excessive drinking including violent crime, drink driving, the effect on health, drink spiking, binge drinking, anti-social behaviour and the effect of alcohol-related crime on the emergency services.  This is Wiltshire

• A survey of British men has found 96 percent experience work-related stress, and 37 percent use alcohol as a way to put work behind them. Monsters & Critics

• Police in Bolton are warning troublemakers that they could face football banning orders for violence and disorder in the town during the World Cup. The orders are usually reserved for hooligans who wreak havoc in and around football grounds but police say drunken yobs spilling from the town's pubs after crunch games will be targeted.  This is Lancashire

• Meanwhile in Macclesfield everyone convicted of a drink-related offence in the last six months has been sent a personal letter warning that any problems they cause will be punished with a pub ban. Maccelsfield Express

• The number of premises selling alcohol in Northern Ireland should not be increased, the Government was told last night - by alcohol sellers. The Federation of the Retail Licensed Trade in Northern Ireland urged the Government not to ignore its own review. The Department of Social Development's consultation on changes to current liquor licensing legislation showed that 98 per cent of respondents were opposed to the abolition of the liquor licence surrender principle. Currently, a new liquor licence cannot be issued by the courts without an existing licence having first been surrendered.  Belfast Telegraph

• Alcohol is fuelling a vicious circle of assaults and retribution that has led to an increase in knife casualties over the past two years. Ninewells Hospital accident and emergency specialist Neil Nichol said staff were now dealing with stabbings and slashings on an almost daily basis.  Evening Telegraph

• Northern Ireland: the prevalence of foetal alcohol syndrome and other complications resulting from alcohol consumption during pregnancy is not recorded and not known.  House of Commons Hansard

• Numbers of drunkenness offences in England from House of Commons Hansard

• Parliamentary question on AHRSE.  House of Commons Hansard
  

  Tim Loughton: To ask the Secretary of State for Health when the scheme to establish alcohol health workers in accident and emergency departments, general practitioner surgeries and some criminal justice settings announced in November 2005 will begin.

  Caroline Flint: This scheme is an aspect of a series of trailblazer pilot sites to be implemented in 24 dedicated sites. We are in discussion with strategic health authorities as to how they can be delivered and when they will begin.