Comparing alcohol behaviours in Scotland and Northern Ireland to evaluate an alcohol minimum unit pricing policy
Alcohol has long been established as a major contributor to the global burden of disease, injury, and mortality, with significant social and economic costs. In 2018 the Scottish government became the first country to introduce a price floor on alcohol sold, setting a legally binding minimum price of 50 pence per UK unit of alcohol sold. Wales followed suit in 2020, and the Republic of Ireland in 2022; while other governments such as England and Northern Ireland consider such policies. The proposed research will use longitudinal household data collected in Understanding Society to evaluate the impact of the Scottish minimum unit alcohol pricing (MUP) policy on alcohol behaviours of adults and young people. Inequalities arising from the policy will be considered e.g., whether there are differential effects for low-income households, gender etc. Understanding Society allows for a natural experiment research approach to evaluation. Specifically, the cross-country design will be exploited, to compare alcohol behaviours in Scotland, the intervention country, with Northern Ireland, a relatively similar control country in the UK for which the MUP legislation has not come into force. The available waves of Understanding Society record alcohol behaviours of adults and young people affording a before and after -policy implementation comparison. The aim of this work is to provide a robust evaluation as to the effect of the MUP in Scotland on individual’s and household’s alcohol behaviours, which can inform policy development in the jurisdictions for which it has been implemented, as well as for those contemplating its implementation.
