Port drinking is not what it was when men like Pitt the Younger and Samuel Johnson would drink three bottles a day or more. But Christmas is the one time of the year when most of us recreate those heroic days with the Stilton. In our household the Port season stretches from late autumn to spring, drinking a nice tawny is cheaper than putting the central heating on. Or rather was. In the last budget the chancellor upped the duty on stronger wines putting an extra £2 plus VAT on a bottle of 20% alcohol Port.
What’s not entirely obvious is what the Conservatives hope to achieve with the new taxation system. Is it to raise money from a perennial cash cow, drinkers, or is it a health drive to get people onto lower alcohol drinks? In the past, government meddling with duty had a clearer purpose: raising money and punishing the French.
Until the 17th century most people if they drank wine would have drunk claret, wine from Bordeaux, but the so-called Glorious Revolution of 1688 when William of Orange and Mary II came to the throne ushered in over a century of warfare with France which would only end with Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo. Suddenly drinking French wine was downright unpatriotic. In 1693 the King put up the duty on French wine, by 1698 it was £46 a cask while the wine itself would only have cost around £12. There was an enormous amount of smuggling but largely people moved over to Portuguese wines which had a favourable rate of duty. At first the wine was not much to English tastes but would evolve into a strong, sweet fortified wine that very much was: Port - named after the city of Oporto from where it was shipped.
At the same time that foreign policy was changing wines for the middle and upper classes, it would also affect how the lower orders drank with devastating consequences. The Worshipful Company of Distillers had a monopoly on the production of spirits, William III saw the breaking of this monopoly and taxing spirits, largely gin, as a way to raise money to pay for war with France. It was also a way of shoring up support in parliament with landowners who had a glut of grain thanks to a succession of good harvests which could be distilled. He put the duty up on brandy from France and beer, and after 1694 a glass of gin cost less than beer. Gin consumption in England rose from an estimated 500,000 gallons in 1688 to 19 million in 1742. As Andrew Barr writes in his brilliant Drink: A Social History: “The worst period of drunkenness in British history arose as a direct result of government action.”
Getting control of the resulting gin craze proved tortuous partly because many of the ruling classes didn’t particularly care whether the ordinary people were drinking too much gin. It was only when drunkenness led to disorder that it became a problem. It wasn’t as if the toffs were particularly abstemious. As Samuel Johnson wrote: “All the decent people in Lichfield got drunk every night and were not the worst thought of.” In one notorious incident The Gin Act of 1769, an attempt to regain control of the trade, led to two days of riots across London. A crowd tried to storm Newgate prison to release illegal gin traders imprisoned there. When the soldiers were sent in to regain control around 285 were killed.
Attitudes to drunken debauchery began to change in the 19th century. The Temperance movement was originally a progression from the slavery emancipation campaign. After freeing slaves, it turned its attention to freeing the working man and his family from the evils of drink. But also factory work demanded punctuality and a degree of sobriety. The twins of morality and efficiency would transform the government’s relationship with alcohol and its people.
To stop Londoners from going on all weekend benders, the 1839 Metropolitan Police Act ruled that pubs could not open on Sundays until 1pm. The act also forbade the selling of spirits to children in pubs. It wasn’t until much later, however, that the Intoxicating Liquor Act of 1901 banned children under 14 from buying any alcohol in pubs - though they were still allowed to buy bottles corked and seals to bring home to their parents. A loophole that I am sure was much abused.
Despite all the new legislation, on the eve of the First World War, Londoners could legally drink in pubs from 5 am until 12:30 am. The 1914 Defence of the Realm Act severely curtailed drinking hours. The worry was that alcohol was damaging the war effort. David Lloyd George, who was prime minister in the latter stages of the war, said: “Drink is doing us more damage during the war than all the German submarines put together.” Lloyd George was a teetotaler and his government flirted with outright prohibition.
Pubs were only allowed to sell beer from noon until 2:30pm and then again from 6 until 9pm in the evening. Buying rounds was banned, even husbands were prohibited from buying a drink for their wives. Amazingly afternoon closing persisted until the 1980s and despite liberalisation and the promise of 24 hour drinking under New Labour it’s still not easy to get a drink after 11pm. But human ingenuity will always find a way and the strict laws led to the creation of clubs where people could drink away the afternoon. At one point to circumvent strict Sunday drinking laws, it was estimated that 60% of Welsh men were members of a club of one sort or another. In London clubs such as The Colony Room or Gerry’s were popular haunts with artists and piss artists such as Francis Bacon, Dylan Thomas and Shane MacGowan.
But lasting effect on our drinking habits isn’t just in absurd licensing laws but in the strength of the beer. Beer historian Ron Pattinson writes: “On average, UK beer was 19 percent weaker in the 1920s than it had been in 1914.” Traditional British beer remains weak to this day and even continental lagers when introduced to England in the ‘60s and ‘70s were at reduced strength.
To pay for the war effort, income tax came in for everyone, previously only the wealthy had paid it. This was the start of a dramatic shift in the government’s relationship with alcohol and its people. In the 19th century the government obtained up to 40% of its income from various taxes on alcohol but today it’s down to 1.3%. Furthermore, the creation of the NHS after the Second World War meant that the state became increasingly involved in the health of the population. Andrew Barr writes: “When the health of the working classes was their own concern they were largely left alone with their vices or seen as a cash cow but once the welfare state came in then their health became a matter for the state leading to the rise of the public health industrial complex.”
The government and various public health bodies since the 1980s have an obsession with getting average consumption down rather than targeting problem drinkers. In 1987 a report by the Royal College of Physicians recommended that men drink no more than 21 units of alcohol per week and women 14. Richard Smith, who worked on the report, later admitted: “those limits were really plucked out of the air. They were not based on any firm evidence at all. It was a sort of an intelligent guess.” In 2016, the recommendations were lowered to 14 units for men and women. Earlier this year the World Health Organisation (WHO) produced a report entitled: ‘No level of alcohol consumption is safe for our health’ - so there you have it.
The clever thing about public health is when taxes go up on drinks as they inevitably do, the government can pretend it’s for our own health rather than just a money grab. The latest rise in duty hasn’t just seen Port pummeled, Rishi Sunak, another teetotal prime minister, saw it as an incentive for: “small craft spirit and wine producers innovate lower-strength products.” So now the supermarkets are awash with wines below 11%, fine for a German riesling, not so nice with an Australian shiraz. According to the Wines and Spirits Trade Association (WSTA), the recent rise in duty actually saw the government take decrease but it can be seen as a win for public health… or something.
Things are worse, or about to be worse north of the border. Despite Scotch whisky being Scotland’s biggest export, the SNP is currently consulting on legislation that will make it all but invisible in its home nation. Promotion of any sort will be banned from Famous Grouse on a Scottish rugby shirt to a window display in Royal Mile Whiskies. According to SNP logic, the very sight of an alcohol brand is enough to set the poor wee children on the road to ruin.
If you want to see the future for drinkers, it’s 3.4% ‘session wines’ in plain packaging bought from a supermarket, because all the pubs have closed, and consumed in your freezing Net Zero home. It’s enough to make anyone turn to drink.
Merry Christmas!
"The act also forbade the selling of spirits to children in pubs."
And today we're terrified if children get too much sugar...
Nice piece