wsdante

Found some debating figures I collected (mostly from The Office of Statistics) quite a while back and thought I'd post them just as a matter of record.

In 2001:

£36.6b was spent on alcohol, equivalent to 5.8% of all consumer expenditure.

UK consumers spend more of their disposable income on alcohol than on, for example, personal goods and services, fuel and power ...or tobacco.

In comparison, Britons spent £7.2b on activities such as going to the cinema, theatre, museum and bingo combined

Alcohol related annual cost to health services: £20.5b
Alcohol related annual cost to police/legal services: £1b
Total:21b

Smoking cost the NHS £2.7b annually.

Since these figures are 8 years out of date, and the number of smokers have since been considerably culled, I guess there's an even greater difference between the totals now.

Today, Gordon Brown refuses to go along with the recommendations of a committee HE set up when it comes to the conclusion that cannabis doesn't warrant its class B status - but should be class C. 

Yet, the measures implemented by government to curb the excesses of binge-drinking culture are, frankly, as pathetic as they are ineffective.

Funny ol' world, innit?