Drunk and orderly

In the adult world of the pub, under-18s can learn to drink alcohol responsibly

Why are so many young people so bad at getting drunk? No sooner have they necked a couple of lagers or downed a bottle of sickly alcopop than they start parading through the streets, skirts up or trousers down. There’s no dignity to their drunkenness. They get obviously, stupidly drunk. Things have got so bad that this week the British Red Cross — more used to helping out in disaster zones — suggested teaching young people ‘alcohol first aid’, to give them the ‘ability and confidence to cope in a [drinking] crisis’.

The inability of today’s yoof to consume booze in an adult fashion is, ironically, a by-product of the authorities’ war on underage drinking. New Labour and the Liberal-Conservative coalition have promoted a zero-tolerance attitude towards teenage drinking. They have introduced stiff punishments for any public house that dares to pull a pint for a 15-, 16- or 17-year-old.