A new study has revealed the SNP’s flagship minimum alcohol pricing policy has done little to curb harm to Scotland’s most hardened drinkers.

The controversial move saw cheap alcohol effectively banned in Scotland when it was finally introduced five years ago following a long legal battle. Ministers promised it would reduce deaths, hospital admissions and jobless rates among the nation’s heaviest boozers.

However, new research revealed today by the Sunday Post suggests the much-vaunted experiment has largely failed. It found little change in the drinking behaviour of those whose consumption causes the most harm to society and were supposed to be the original target of the policy.

While the study did detect a slight drop in OVERALL alcohol consumption – ie among ordinary Scots who did not have a drink problem in the first place – the authors conclude: “The lack of evidence for a decline in the prevalence of harmful drinking arising from minimum unit pricing is contrary to model-based evidence that formed the introduction of the policy.”

Want to see more SNP fails? – Politics Matters