When journalists report on problems like alcohol-related violence and crime, studies have shown that we often do this in a way that encourages victim-blaming. Ugly drunks are an easy target and an easy story to tell.

It’s much more complicated — and less s-xy — to look at the complexity of forces which combine to make hazardous drinking almost a social norm in Australia. Here’s one to consider: national competition policies which have eased restrictions on liquor licensing and contributed to a proliferation of alcohol outlets, helping to keep prices relatively low, and thus creating plenty of work for the cops.

The National Alcohol Strategy notes, for example, that the price of wine dropped in real terms between 1998-99 and 2003-4, while spirits have stayed at almost the same price in real terms for the past decade. Meanwhile, in Victoria the number of liquor licences almost tripled from around 4,000 in 1986 to more than 12,000 in 2004. Research has shown that alcohol-related violence tends to be more common in places with more alcohol outlets and/or extended trading hours, and that pricing has a direct effect on consumption and associated harms.

The liberalisation of alcohol regulation is not only affecting health within Australia but is also a by-product internationally of trade agreements. Sweden and Finland, for example, had to dismantle much alcohol regulation upon joining the European Union, and then watched cirrhosis death rates soar.

In Australia, there is overwhelming evidence of alcohol’s impact on health and safety. The National Alcohol Strategy cites research showing that 62% of all alcohol is consumed at levels that risk short-term harm, and that alcohol is involved in 62% of all police attendances and 73% of assaults. Young adults are most likely to drink dangerously.

So what could governments do to reduce this toll? An informal Crikey survey of leading policy experts suggests the following: taxation reform including incentives to promote low-alcohol products, and taxing wine according to its alcohol content; enforcement of stricter regulations on sale and marketing; a ban on alcohol sponsorship of sport; and hard-hitting public awareness campaigns.

Governments only need look to their own National Alcohol Strategy to learn that “many of the dangers of alcohol for those who drink, and those around them, are misunderstood, tolerated or ignored.” Recent experience in the NT suggests that governments can save lives by raising alcohol taxes, while the introduction of random breath testing shows it is possible to shift community attitudes and behaviour.

But only an eternal optimist would expect governments to seriously take on the many powerful interests which profit from our inebriation, including clubs and pubs, the brewing, spirits and wine industries, sporting organisations, supermarket chains and the advertising and media industries. Alcohol is also a nice little earner for governments with the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare estimating that net government revenue associated with alcohol was $5.1 billion in 2004-05.

The other critical barrier is our well-entrenched grog culture — even the National Alcohol Strategy refers to our love of “getting p-ssed”. It’s not politically smart to be labelled a wowser. It might also be rather uncomfortable for politicians and other powerbrokers to examine their own drinking. As one recent journal article noted, in most countries, politicians and the well-to-do middle classes generally are more likely to drink than the population at large, while tobacco is more associated with the lower classes. “For politicians and journalists, alcohol tends to be ‘our drug’, while tobacco is increasingly ‘theirs’,” the article noted.

All of which may explain why many journalists and politicians prefer to portray excessive drinking as someone else’s problem.

Tomorrow: How the health benefits of alcohol have been oversold

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