Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív: I am delighted to have an opportunity to speak on the Bill. I strongly support the thrust of the Bill. Some small issues still remain to be dealt with concerning craft beer, for example, because that industry does not have the advertising power to do the damage alcohol does in society. I am not against making minor changes to the legislation but we cannot pull back in terms of the big import of the Bill. We all heard reports in the past week of what happened in Bandon where young people went to a non-drink disco totally tanked up and a field hospital had to be set up to deal with them. I am not against people having a drink and I am not against people having a good time but to me that was neither; it was a total abuse of alcohol. To say that advertising, availability, and the society we have created has nothing to do with that is to deny reality. Let us be honest about it; drinking habits have changed dramatically over the years. There was a time when young people in particular tended to drink beer and they thought they were big people doing that. Now it seems that the drink of choice is hard spirits in a totally unregulated situation, often outside of places where there is no control whatsoever. Therefore, anything that can be done to control such drinking should be done........

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