BristolUK

Bet there are a few opinions on this.

dbd33

I expect it's bollocks, if drink is expensive people take drugs instead, and Canadians drift through life in a dopey blur. However, the worst of the alcohol distribution mechanism in Ontario isn't the minimum pricing but the state run stores; in addition to collecting high prices they limit choice, limit access, and employ an army of affluent civil servants to no good purpose. It would be possible to have minimum prices and still have beer, wines and spirits in Costco as well as specialty wine stores offering the broad range of products one sees in such wine meccas as Buffalo NY and Denver CO.

Oh, and thinking not only of the drink but cigarette smoking laws in Canada, one has to ask "at what price is health worth having?". Is ten more years of living healthily in, say, Mississauga, a blessing or a curse?

Shard

It's not bs at all, and although some would substitute cheap drugs (if they indeed are that cheap) many would not. You only need to visit a UK high street on a Friday or Saturday night to see the young and impoverished lying in gutters from over consuming dirt cheap drinks much as they would have done in Hogarth's time. England should follow Scotland and Canada in introducing minimum pricing (though state control is going a bit too far).

magnumpi

IMO it's more to do with the culture. The drinking and pub culture is only a fraction of that in the UK. It's more coffee n a movie here.

Not high on my list, but on the list of things that would improve my health was the fact that the pub culture was not as popular in Canada. And it's not !

MarkG

Kids today... when I was young, the reprobates would brew huge barrels of horrible-tasting but strong beer themselves for a cost of pretty much nothing.

ninaDGBCA

I agree with you on that. I've been to Norway plenty of times and alcohol is incredible expensive there but people still get hammered. Because Canadians rather have only a couple drinks and a bbq or a coffee after work or soda at the work's Christmas do they drink less. If there was a drinking/pub culture the price of alcohol or LCBO restrictions wouldn't stop people from drinking.

Oink

No, they drink at home, a lot. There's something quite disturbing the way Canadians drink.

dbd33

I can see that out of the window here any weekday afternoon. Just yesterday I heard some cradle clucking about all those drunk homeless youths across the road. I was much amused when a Nepalese programmer, of whom I had previously thought little, started in with the questions I don't bother asking the locals:

"How do you know they're homeless? They could be students"

"Why do you think it's just the drink? There's weed and meth sold on the corner"

etc. etc.

The streets I see in Canada are strewn with bodies morning noon and night, people routinely get drunk and freeze to death outside our office. If, statistically, Canada has less substance abuse than the UK, that's because the Canadians a) focus on booze alone and b) don't notice and so don't count the native population.

dbd33

They drink in their trucks. Walk along the verge of any country road, scrape away the fag ends and Tim Horton's cups, and there's a rich bounty in deposits on bottles thrown out of the window.

Former Lancastrian

So going out to a bar/pub and ordering 8 rum and cokes at $5 each plus tip is more desirable than say picking up a 26 oz bottle of rum and a couple of 2 litre bottles of coke for the same price if not even cheaper and drinking as much as you want at home.

Its minus 30C outside where would you sooner be?

dbd33

Florida.

bats

Noooo, canadians seem to be divided into the holier than thou2 drinks and you're an alkie crowd and the lets drink beer while mowing the lawn, fixing the roof, ooo how about a shot party and where's the wacky baccy lot

Atlantic Xpat

Heavy drinking seems to be the norm in these parts with George St (Most pubs per capita of any city in North America) being Soddom and Gomorrah any night of the week. In the event of a forecasted blizzard or hurricane, Liquor stores do a roaring trade. "Yes by' got me a 24 and a snow shovel, I'm all set." I know of apparently otherwise sensible people who consider it quite acceptable to get on their quads and ride over to someone elses cabin, get pissed and ride back. But of course drink driving in cars and trucks is wrong.

There seems to be a bit of a taboo with lunchtime drinking though. Work colleagues look at me as though I'm some kind of alcoholic if I have a small beer with my lunch.

magnumpi

Canadians do drink at home, yes I can agree with that. But the ones I know and my neighbours just do a bottle or two. To me that's not having a drinking problem, or culture, it's just having a couple. Then they stop and put on the kettle.

We have a free bar at our Xmas doo every year. No one is carried out or arrested. In Britain it would not be a cost effective bar.

I don't see 100's of Canadians binge drinking their way through the week ends.

Jingsamichty

Canadians drink like they do everything else... homogenously, and by the season.

Oh, it's summer, so I'll have Baileys in my coffee!
Oh, it's patio time, let's have a cold beer!
Oh, it's winter, let's have a rum and coke!

I know plenty of Canadians who like to get spectacularly drunk - fair play there - but I don't see any appreciation for the taste. Is there such a thing as CAMRA in Canada? Very few pubs seem to take pride in the variety and quality of their products, it's just like Britain in the 70s/80s in that respect.