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The Manchester Evening News (MEN) recently ran an article about potential Government plans to put an end to early morning drinking at airports,

“Earlier this year, a review by the House of Lords looked at ending 24-hour drinking in airports – and now the Home Office intends to issue a ‘call for evidence’ to ‘assess the impact of implementing the Licensing Act on airside premises on reducing alcohol related disorder’.”

I’m no stranger to the occasional ‘breakfast beer’ to kick off stag weekends, or more often, a glass of champagne to set the holiday mood when heading off somewhere exciting. That said, there’s no doubt that people being drunk on planes can be potentially dangerous as well as extremely irritating, so there’s clearly a balance to be struck.

According to the MEN, the number of interventions required due to alcohol related incidents at Manchester Airport has been trending upwards in recent years,

“Police boarded aircraft 159 times in 2016, 110 times in 2015, and 73 times in 2014, with more of half the incidents in 2016 involving alcohol or drugs… A total of 116 people were stopped from boarding a plane at the airport in 2016, with 52 people being arrested.”

If that trend has continued and is reflected elsewhere in the country, it’s something that needs to be given some thought, but when it comes to legal changes, knee-jerk responses are usually best avoided.

I’m not at all convinced that stopping people from drinking before a certain time at airports would make any real difference – it’s usually flights later in the day (particularly Friday evenings!) that have more issues in my experience. I would suggest that having better policies (or better enforcement of existing policies) to prevent people who are clearly intoxicated from boarding might be a better idea than legislating for an arbitrary time when having a drink is acceptable.

For what it’s worth, I don’t envisage this ‘call for evidence’ leading to any substantial changes – most of the parliamentarians I’ve met would be outraged at the suggestion, judging from their views when BA got rid of complimentary G&Ts!

Given that I wrote this at the weekend with a glass of wine in front of me, I could well be a little biased, so what do you reckon – a sensible change or a stuffy outburst of unwelcome puritanism? 😉

Via LoyaltyLobby