Cyrille Isaac-Sibille (MoDem, affiliated with Macron’s party) would like to table an amendment to the 2024 Social Security Financing Bill (PLFSS) to put a minimum price per unit of alcohol to protect both public health and the wine industry.
With the introduction of such a measure, the price of an alcoholic beverage would be aligned with its alcohol content and could not go below a certain price.
“Insofar as this is not a tax, but a minimum price, it would preserve the wine industry while limiting alcohol-related deaths”, said Isaac-Sibille.
The interministerial mission for the fight against drugs and addictive behaviour (MIDELCA) argues in favour of this approach. A minimum price would guarantee an increase in profits for independent wine producers, to the detriment of industrialists and distributors, unlike a tax whose benefits accrue to the state, it argues.
MIDELCA also points out that the application of a minimum price of €0.5 per unit of alcohol would lead to a 15% reduction in volumes purchased by households, and a 22% reduction in cancer-related mortality attributable to alcohol.
France ranks fourth among OECD countries in terms of alcohol consumption per capita, with 41,000 avoidable deaths per year.
Isaac-Sibille wants to follow the example of Scotland, which in 2018 became the first country to introduce a minimum price for alcohol of 50 pence per unit, or around 57 euro cents.
The measure has proved an effective lever for public health. The country has seen a 13.4% drop in the number of deaths attributable to alcohol consumption and a 4.1% fall in the number of hospital admissions.
The amendment will be tabled in the text of the PLFSS, but there is a strong chance that it will be inadmissible, because the measure has no impact on social security finances, since it is not a tax.
Isaac-Sibille will nevertheless raise this proposal in the Social Affairs Committee.
(Clara Bauer-Babef | Euractiv.fr)
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