This week the British Government, led by ‘Old Scrotum-Face’ Gordon Brown, announced one of the most offensive and ill thought out so called ‘policies’ of his rocky and tenuous career as Prime Minister.
The proposed plan has managed to target two of the most vulnerable (and therefore incapable of answering back)groups in our society…at the same time:
alcoholics on State benefit.
The plan is that any registered alcoholics, who are in receipt of said benefits, will have their money stopped unless they ‘clean up their act’, by attending State
run courses in ‘Not Having A Drink’.
The precedent for this is the scheme whereby heroin addicts are similarly treated, the official line behind this being “Why should state benefit money go into the hands of drug dealers?”
The simple answer to this of course is “Because heroin is illegal.”
I read a great quote recently which suggested that prohibition leads to a total lack of control, whereas taxation (as a result of legalisation) leads to not only regulation, but also a pretty decent source of State revenue. But Hey, that’s another story and another rant altogether.
The thing is, as anyone with even a fraction of a brain(that’s me then..) will tell you, that an addict has to be ready to make the change before anything else will have any sort of effect at all.
Forcing alcohol dependents into ‘reforming’ at a set time and place will only serve to have the total opposite effect, as will trying to starve them into submission. It will increase the ‘fear'(as I’ve always referred to it) and force them into finding solace in the most obvious way, I.E. through the bottom of a bottle.
If the Government had run a competition to find the most ineffective and inappropriate way of dealing with alcoholism, then this would have been the clear winner.
Unfortunately, Gordon Brown is a dour Presbyterian, and they aren’t exactly known for their love (and therefore understanding) of the demon drink. As for dependency, well, if you ain’t been there, then it’s almost impossible to understand how that feels.
I’ve been an alcoholic for the last 25 years, and even though I’ve have relative control of it for the last 15 years or so rather than it controlling me, I still have my weak moments when only a drink will do. No amount of legislation or threats will ever solve that one, it’s a very personal thing.
This is obviously a knee-jerk reaction (like being hit in the shin with a sledgehammer) designed to make it look like it’s taking tough action on the economy. All this in a month where Government Ministers’ dodgy expense account claims have been in the news, but where no Minister has had their salary stopped, let alone faced dismissal for blatant theft from the taxpayer, it all seems a bit like a school bully picking on the weakest targets.
So what comes next? Smoking cigarettes, eating too many burgers, cancer?
Perhaps if I go to the doctor with an ear-ache, they might stop a just portion of my benefits for ‘listening to music too loudly’. Maybe they should just send Officials to trip us over so they can kick us when we’re down… sensible policies for a happier Britain…
I’ll drink to that!