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Mr. Swayne: Were I the hon. Member for Pudsey, I would not countenance such an amendment precisely for the reason that other Bills on this subject have failed as a result of containing a provision for mystery shopping.

None the less, if we are creating a new offence, it is perfectly proper to consider how we should test whether it is being committed. Let us face it, the person who is sold alcohol illegally under the Bill's provisions is hardly likely to enter a complaint at a police station about the law being broken. We are of course aware of the law being broken from more general symptoms in society on Friday and Saturday nights and from drunken disorder on estates and shopping parades, although finding out who is breaking the law would be assisted by the amendment for which Alcohol Concern has asked.

Alcohol Concern has raised hon. Members' worries about empowering police officers and trading standards officers to wage a vendetta by attempting entrapment, but I would have all sorts of difficulty with such an

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amendment. I do not know whether, on balance, I would have opposed the Bill if it had contained such a measure. I doubt that it would have been sufficient impediment for me to have withheld my support--I could be persuaded that the measure would strengthen the Bill--but I am certain that there would be sufficient Members not of that view. Therefore, if we are to enact the Bill, it is better to do so without the provision.

Miss Kirkbride: My hon. Friend surprises me because he is suggesting that there should be provision to incite someone to break the law. Given that I have served on many Standing Committees with him, I would not have thought that he would have been tempted by that.

Mr. Swayne: My hon. Friend is right; I am not tempted by that. However, we are faced with a grave social problem and one remedy would be to instil a proper fear among licensees and their servants--that is the terminology that we have been using--so that they are more vigilant. The test-purchasing provision would achieve that. For all my concerns for liberty and entrapment, however, we must consider expediency. We are faced with an enormous problem, and these problems sometimes require such solutions. As I said, I would not have regarded the provision as a weakness, but I am certain, especially from the thrust of my hon. Friend's remarks and precisely because she sits on the Opposition Benches, that it is better for the Bill that it is not included.

I said that the Bill was good for licensees. It is also good for our constituents, particularly on Friday and Saturday nights. There has been much discussion of why people are seeking alcohol in greater amounts, which has prompted us to try to close a loophole.

My hon. Friend the Member for South Staffordshire (Sir P. Cormack) said that that could be attributed largely to the decline in what he called responsible parenting. He said that he had always encouraged his two sons to drink socially--to share a glass of wine at the dinner table--from a youthful age to encourage a responsible attitude to drinking.

I entirely understand that point of view, but my hon. Friend must recognise the social reality. These days, many families rarely sit down together for a meal. It is all very well for us to say that they ought to do so, but if they do not, we must address our public policy to the reality, rather than to some ideal that existed in the past.

My hon. Friend the Member for Meriden produced statistics to quantify the problem that the Bill seeks to tackle. I view those statistics with some scepticism. I have the Institute of Alcohol Studies fact sheet, "Alcohol and Young People", to which, I think, she was drawing attention. It seems to be compiled largely of statistics that can have been acquired only by asking the young people concerned.

My first reservation is that such surveys tend to be skewed. The people who tend to be asked are those who have evidenced a problem. The very nature of the sample therefore produces a distorted view. Secondly, as I noted in an earlier intervention, there is a tendency among young boys between the ages of about 11 and 16 to exaggerate their achievements, whether in the consumption of alcohol, sexual prowess or any other activity. People tend to boast.

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Some of the alarmist surveys that draw dramatic attention to the problem have a use, in that they focus attention on the problem, but they tend to exaggerate. The problem needs no exaggeration. We all know from our constituency case load how bad it is. There are estates--even in the New Forest, for heaven's sake--

Mr. Forth: No.

Mr. Swayne: I have the Forest, Totton and Waterside edition of The Southern Daily Echo of last Wednesday. The headline on the front page is "Shame of the Teeny Tipplers". One expects such a headline from a tabloid, but the front-page article is fair and well researched. It names and shames off-licences and public houses that openly sell alcohol to under-age drinkers.

Mr. Forth: I hope that as my hon. Friend develops his argument, he will not only make a case for a new restrictive approach in off-licences, but will deal with the problem of young people being driven away from off-licences into supermarkets or on to the internet as an alternative source of drink. We must not be too complacent about the fact that if the Bill is successful, it may simply open up to under-age people other possibilities for drinking.

Mr. Swayne: I draw my right hon. Friend's attention to the Official Report when it is available on Monday morning, and the remarks that I made earlier to the Minister, specifically highlighting that problem. We must deal with it.

In that respect, I believe that there is an omission from the Bill. That belief is shared by Alcohol Concern, which asks for the promotion of an amendment that would make sure that the purchase and supply of alcohol on behalf of a person under 18 for public, unsupervised consumption is illegal.

It was my opinion that that was not covered by the Bill. Some doubt was raised in my mind by the hon. Member for Northampton, South (Mr. Clarke) when he questioned my hon. Friend the Member for Meriden.

I am not sure whether I understand correctly proposed new section 169F(2), which states:

"A person to whom this subsection applies shall be guilty of an offence if he knowingly allows any person to deliver to a person under 18 intoxicating liquor sold in licensed premises for consumption off the premises."

Does that cover the eventuality that we are considering? I suspect that it does not because of the first line,

"A person to whom this subsection applies".

The subsection applies only to the licensee's servants. An 18-year-old who is sent into a shop to buy alcohol and supply it to under-age drinkers in the parade of shops on a Friday night is not covered. We are all aware and thoroughly fed up of such a scenario. We have all heard the complaints of the people who live nearby. The Bill does not address that.

However, we should not criticise the hon. Member for Pudsey because the Bill does not set out to deal with that problem. The object of the measure is to address the loophole that applies to the licensee's servants.

Miss Kirkbride: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for pointing out where the Bill falls short in stopping the sale

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of alcohol to young people. However, I wonder whether the Bill does not include the sort of provision to which he refers because it would cover parents who bought a bottle of wine, opened it over dinner and gave it to their children. Enforcement of such a provision could therefore be difficult. How can one distinguish between a responsible adult such as the parents I described, and an irresponsible adult who acts for young people who want to go out and get drunk?

Mr. Swayne: That is a good point. I do not know whether existing law covers it, but an obvious provision could be made to cover such an eventuality. It could exclude responsible parents and alcohol consumed in the home of those parents. However, we face a problem of youths on Friday nights who are properly denied alcohol by licensees or their servants, but seek a sympathetic friend to purchase the alcohol for them. They consume it in the parade of the shops outside the licensee's premises and cause misery for the surrounding estate because they become inflamed by alcohol.

I have written to Ministers to draw attention to the problem, and I have raised it on the Floor of the House. I have asked how we should deal with such individuals. The frequent answer is that we should consider anti-social behaviour orders. I accept that that is of some comfort. However, the root problem is that the crime can be committed in the first place. Perhaps the Minister could tell us whether the Bill is amendable to cover the eventuality we are discussing.

Mr. Maclean: I agree that a serious social problem exists and that the Bill should get through today. I have examined the official Home Office statistics to which my hon. Friend referred a few moments ago on the abuse of alcohol by young people. I am alarmed to discover that the peak year for convictions of people aged between 18 and 21 for drunkenness and alcohol problems was 15 years ago in 1985, when he allegedly had dark hair and was evicted from a public house in the company of young people. Sixteen thousand people were convicted in 1985; the figure fell to 6,000 in 1995. A serious problem exists, but the numbers have reduced from the time when he may have been leading the statistics.

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