Ross Bell: There's only one way to deal with teen drinking

COMMENT

The minimum age for buying liquor should be 20, said 75 per cent of New Zealanders in a television news poll. Support for age 20 is now 5 per cent higher than a poll in mid-1999, which Parliament ignored when it voted to lower the age to 18.

It appears New Zealand is willing to learn from Parliament's mistakes, but only a lucky dip from the ballot box of private members' bills will put this right.

Prime Minister Helen Clark says the effects of lowering the drinking age, as shown in the latest Ministry of Justice report, were entirely predictable. Over the 1990s the proportion of 14 to 17-year-olds who drank liquor did not change but, among those who did drink, amounts and frequency both increased.

In 2000, 18 and 19-year-olds had become the heaviest drinking group and the most marked increases in drinking were among 14 to 17-year-olds.

Prosecutions for drink-driving increased for both these age groups between 2000 and 2002. Police reported increased binge drinking, teenagers too drunk to look after themselves and intoxicated young girls at risk.

The Alcohol Advisory Council's latest report, The Way We Drink, shows underage drinkers find it easy to get liquor, whether they buy it for themselves or get friends or siblings over 18 to buy it for them.

The Prime Minister and the Ministers of Health and Justice voted against lowering the drinking age, but the Government seems unwilling to change the law back. The problem, according to the Prime Minister, is that "the jury is out on whether there should be an attempt to change the law or whether there should be more emphasis on education programmes".

Internationally, the jury is well and truly in on whether regulation or education is more effective in reducing alcohol-related harm. An international team of researchers, sponsored by the World Health Organisation, reviewed evidence on the effectiveness of different policy approaches.

A report, Alcohol: No Ordinary Commodity, states that the effect of education and persuasion programmes "tends to be small at best" and does not persist.

School-based programmes increase knowledge and can change attitudes towards liquor, but drinking behaviour remains unaffected.

Despite good intentions, media public education campaigns are also an ineffective antidote to high-quality, pro-alcohol advertising messages that appear much more often.

A strong effectiveness rating was given to regulating the availability of liquor and to alcohol taxes that increase prices. Laws that raise the minimum legal purchasing age reduce liquor sales and problems among young drinkers. Enforcement of laws against sales to minors, including licence suspension and removal, can be also effective.

Reduced hours and days of sale and numbers of outlets was associated with reduced liquor use and alcohol-related problems.

In 1999 all MPs were given research evidence about the harmful experiences of lowering the drinking age in Australia, Canada and American states, and the positive effects of raising it again, as the United States did in 1984.

The Ministry of Justice report rightly says that the statistics don't prove that increases in teenage drinking and drink-driving were directly caused by the lower drinking age alone. But this is not the only "wrong message" we have been sending to teenagers.

As a result of licensing changes in 1989, there are now two and a half times as many places where liquor can be bought. Sales of wine and beer increased once they could be picked up at supermarkets as can milk or frozen peas.

Since 1992 considerable talent has been devoted to liquor advertising on television and radio, which is "self-regulated" by the industries involved.

The liquor industry is such an important client for broadcasters that state television, for example, gives them a 54 per cent discount. Last September, it decided liquor advertising on television could start at 8.30pm instead of 9pm, and Government ministers did nothing. At that time of the evening, 26 per cent of 12 to 17-year-olds are watching television.

When the drinking age was changed, the then Prime Minister said it would be "18 with enforcement", but the police and licensing inspectors received no additional resources.

The relevant legislation defines acceptable proof-of-age documents but doesn't require anyone to ask for them. Police and inspectors may be able to prosecute or cancel licences if they catch licensees or staff selling liquor to a minor, but they can't enforce age-verification practices to prevent it.

Adults other than a parent or guardian may not supply alcohol to minors, either - unless it's at a "private social gathering". Unsurprisingly, many teenagers feel adults are deeply hypocritical about alcohol.

It's time the Government, political parties, communities and parents all took alcohol policy and alcohol-related harm more seriously. Not only is it estimated to cost New Zealand a net $2.4 billion to $16.1 billion a year - choose your economist - but it's putting our children at risk.

* Ross Bell is executive director of the Drug Foundation.