The Results Are In...

MrJoeSoap

... and we won! Fair play folks, its been a tough time but we shone through in the end. Go and celebrate, Irish style!

http://www.finfacts.com/irelandbusinessnews/publish/article_10006077.shtml

A report funded by the European Commission and produced by the UK Institute of Alcohol Studies, has said a higher proportion of income in Ireland is spent on alcohol than in any other European Union country.

The report, published today, also says that Irish people are the biggest binge drinkers in the EU.

The survey shows that Ireland is spending three times more than any other country and ten times more than Greece.

Young Irish people also top their table for binge drinking. The report shows 32% of 15 and 16-year-olds had binge drunk three or more times in the month.

The Netherlands is second on that table with 28%.

Household alcohol spending is three times more than any European household. We spend on average €1,675 on alcohol - followed by Denmark which spends €531.

By far the greatest proportion and level of expenditure on alcohol in Europe is found in Ireland, with each household spending nearly €PPP17008 on alcohol each year.9 This is three times the level of any other country, and over ten times as much as Greece. More generally, expenditure is much lower in the wine producing countries than in the rest of the EU15, reflecting the relatively low price of alcohol in Southern Europe.

tallus

Don't mind if I do

thelordofcheese

MrJoeSoap wrote:

... and we won! Fair play folks, its been a tough time but we shone through in the end. Go and celebrate, Irish style!

are you buying the first round?

Archeron

Jeigermeisters all round!!!

Tar.Aldarion

Finally all the hard work has paid off, I can stop drinking now.

Terry

it's all them damn immigints. coming over here and stealing our women and drinking all our beer.

right. cigarette and then i'm off out for a few cans.

Sangre

Thats only because its so ridiculously expensive here for drink.

fade2black

It truely is a great day.

danniemcq

Tar.Aldarion wrote:

Finally all the hard work has paid off, I can stop drinking now.

hell no we gotta stay there now, and thats when the real drinkin starts when some other country thinks they can take the crown from us.

let us join together tonight and raise a keg to our future

MrJoeSoap

Sangre wrote:

Thats only because its so ridiculously expensive here for drink.

Still doesn't explain how we spent three times as much as the next closest country.

We're deadly, just face it.

MrJoeSoap

danniemcq wrote:

let us join together tonight and raise a keg to our future

Amen to that. You do mean a keg each though don't you?

Ruu_Old

Well done to all involved

slipss

Just out of curiosity is this the first one of these surveys carried out or have they been doing them for a few years? cause I'd be amazed if we weren't top every year.

Basq

I'm too intoxicated to reply...


... oh well, there ya go.... guess i wasn't!

Baggly

we ll have to watch those dutch, tho. we dont want to get over confident.....just overdrunk.

stevenmu

What isn't mentioned is that weonly came 4th or 5th in actual consumption, which reveals a couple of uniqely Irish traits. One, we didn't win, so we just quote the statistic that we did best in and convince ourselves thet we're great. And two, we're being completely ripped off and not only are we not complaining, we're actually patting ourselves on the back for it (presumably because we're all to drunk to care).

MrJoeSoap

stevenmu wrote:

What isn't mentioned is that weonly came 4th or 5th in actual consumption, which reveals a couple of uniqely Irish traits. One, we didn't win, so we just quote the statistic that we did best in and convince ourselves thet we're great. And two, we're being completely ripped off and not only are we not complaining, we're actually patting ourselves on the back for it (presumably because we're all to drunk to care).

Maybe we buy loads of drink but can't hack it?

Nah, we're beasts.

Baggly

stevenmu wrote:

What isn't mentioned is that weonly came 4th or 5th in actual consumption, which reveals a couple of uniqely Irish traits. One, we didn't win, so we just quote the statistic that we did best in and convince ourselves thet we're great. And two, we're being completely ripped off and not only are we not complaining, we're actually patting ourselves on the back for it (presumably because we're all to drunk to care).

and we re inventing new hybrid words as we do it. weonly


god bless ireland

ionapaul

Would it really be such a good thing if we were the highest in consumption in Europe? I wouldn't have thought it was a cause for celebration!

MrJoeSoap

ionapaul wrote:

Would it really be such a good thing if we were the highest in consumption in Europe? I wouldn't have thought it was a cause for celebration!

Someone get this man a can, pronto!

iFight

ionapaul wrote:

Would it really be such a good thing if we were the highest in consumption in Europe? I wouldn't have thought it was a cause for celebration!

It would be better, but we still should all have a real sence of national pride. Fair Play to all who helped out

ionapaul

iFight wrote:

It would be better, but we still should all have a real sence of national pride. Fair Play to all who helped out

I think I'm too old - I wouldn't celebrate being crowned the heaviest drinkers in Europe at all. I'm sure the vintners would be thrilled. I do remember when I thought drinking was cool though...back through the mists of time to sometime in the 90s...damn Father Time for making me into such a square! I'm not even 30 yet...

MrJoeSoap

ionapaul wrote:

I think I'm too old - I wouldn't celebrate being crowned the heaviest drinkers in Europe at all. I'm sure the vintners would be thrilled. I do remember when I thought drinking was cool though...back through the mists of time to sometime in the 90s...damn Father Time for making me into such a square! I'm not even 30 yet...

Hope your getting that child geared up to carry on our great tradition!

On a serious note though, we won't be able to keep this rate of drinking up forever, so I think its time we invested in our future. I'm calling for alcohol-related lessons in school, teaching children how to maximise their unit-intake whilst maintaining a level of sobriety to ensure longevity in their drinking efforts.

Yes, I am drunk.

eirebhoy

Also top of the binge drinking league.

1. Ireland
2. Finland
3. Britain

Although, I don't know how they can say 5 pints is binging. Sure that means every time an Irish person goes out they are binge drinking.

MrJoeSoap

eirebhoy wrote:

Although, I don't know how they can say 5 pints is binging. Sure that means every time an Irish person goes out they are binge drinking.

That means I'm binge-drinking even before I go out...

Carb

ionapaul wrote:

I think I'm too old - I wouldn't celebrate being crowned the heaviest drinkers in Europe at all. I'm sure the vintners would be thrilled. I do remember when I thought drinking was cool though...back through the mists of time to sometime in the 90s...damn Father Time for making me into such a square! I'm not even 30 yet...

But we're not the heaviest drinkers in Europe, we're the highest spenders apparently. FFS,what family spends on average 17k per annum on drink. That'd be about 65% of my family's income, and I'm sure I'm not the worst off.

One other thing folks, this data is 7 years old. Maybe they brought it out now to stop people splashing their SSIA cash on drink.

MrJoeSoap

Carb wrote:

FFS,what family spends on average 17k per annum on drink.

Mine.

It was 1,675 though, not 16,750.

casanova_kid

the average Irish person drink 14 litres of ALcohol a year. I think most people drink that in a week.

Carb

MrJoeSoap wrote:

Mine.

It was 1,675 though, not 16,750.

Sorry, I was thrown by the 17008 Purchasing Power Parity figure, what ever that means.

So the fact that the average household spent 32 euro per week on alcohol seven years ago made the news. Christ they must have been stuck for news storys. Maybe Mc Dowell was try to get out of the headlines

casanova_kid wrote:

the average Irish person drink 14 litres of ALcohol a year. I think most people drink that in a week.

There's a big difference in drinking 14 litres of beer and 14 litres of alcohol. You'd probably have to drink nearly 300 pints to get 14 litres of alcohol. But you can try doing it in a week if you want:D

casanova_kid

Carb wrote:

There's a big difference in drinking 14 litres of beer and 14 litres of alcohol. You'd probably have to drink nearly 300 pints to get 14 litres of alcohol. But you can try doing it in a week if you want:D

Damn, i knew I was going wrong somewhere. Has anybody actually ever been surveyed for one of these polls.

MrJoeSoap

casanova_kid wrote:

the average Irish person drink 14 litres of ALcohol a year. I think most people drink that in a week.

14 litres of pure alcohol I assume that means.

casanova_kid wrote:

Damn, i knew I was going wrong somewhere. Has anybody actually ever been surveyed for one of these polls.

It wasn't a poll.

Terry

20 cans over the last 2 days at 5% alcohol. that's one can of alcohol. works out at 25 litres a year. yay, i'm above average.

Snickers Man

What these stats mean in a nutshell:

In 1999 the Irish people didn't drink as much or as often as their European counterparts, but when they did drink they got hammered and fleeced for their pains.

That's it.


Here's a few proposals that will help us all enjoy alcohol more fully, boost the public coffers, make it possible to earn a decent living in the hospitality and leisure sectors, greatly reduce binge drinking and result in less diced-carrot vomit on our streets.

1) Halve the tax on alcohol.
2) Liberalise the licensing laws so that more outlets can serve you modest amounts of alcohol if they wish. eg cafes, restaurants, sporting events etc
3) Promote sensible attitude to alcohol: ie don't chase away sponsorship of sporting occasions

Irish people see the purpose of alcohol as getting drunk. So they don't drink it in a normal fashion. They only drink to binge. Make it a more normal pursuit ie don't identify it with dingy pubs with bouncers on the door and sad bastards sitting at the bar and people will use it for what it's best for. As a tongue loosener and atmosphere generator. Not as a liver tester.

Make it cheap enough that you can have a beer or a bottle of wine with your everyday dinner and not as a treat that you only indulge in at Christmas and birthdays.

Promote alcohol as something nice to drink while doing nice things, like watching a rugby match, fishing or enjoying a nice lunch in the pub with your mates.

That way people would drink more often but more sparingly, the tax take would go up, the bar/cafe/restaurant owners would be happy and we would have a lot less handwringing about 'binge drinking'

It would work.

eirebhoy

Carb wrote:

One other thing folks, this data is 7 years old. Maybe they brought it out now to stop people splashing their SSIA cash on drink.

Where did you get that from? Maybe you're right but it's not just Ireland that this info was released.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/5031624.stm

easy_as_easy

does this 'poll' factor in the price of alcohol in Ireland compared to other EU countries?

sturgo

So were a nation of alcoholic piss artists. What's new or cool about that? I think Eamon Dunphy said it all on the front page of the Herald the other day. It's sad and pethetic. Were being laughed at by the rest of the civilized world.

Mushy

Finally all the hard work has paid off, I can stop drinking now.

Haha, good one.

Sofaspud

sturgo wrote:

Were being laughed at by the rest of the civilized world.

What's so bad about that? Surely laughter is a good thing, and being laughed at is only a bad thing if you can't laugh at yourself, which shows a lack of a sense of humour.

I need more beer, I'm getting too wise.

Baggly

sturgo wrote:

So were a nation of alcoholic piss artists. What's new or cool about that? I think Eamon Dunphy said it all on the front page of the Herald the other day. It's sad and pethetic. Were being laughed at by the rest of the civilized world.

and civilized is a relative term. considering that dunphy was also on page one drunk as two flies trapped in a can, i wouldnt believe or go along with one thing that snake says

if we all didnt 'binge' we d be german, or swiss, or one of those. ill admit that i hate those rowdy drunken idiots on westmoreland st at two in the morning, but i also hate jeeps; what can you do, its other peoples choice and has nothing to do with you or me

YeAh!

sturgo wrote:

So were a nation of alcoholic piss artists. What's new or cool about that? I think Eamon Dunphy said it all on the front page of the Herald the other day. It's sad and pethetic. Were being laughed at by the rest of the civilized world.

I think the rest of the civilised world realises, after visiting Ireland, that our drink is also three times more expensive than any other country in Europe so its no f*cking wonder we are spending so much on drink!!!