The establishment assault, from both left and right, on "Booze Britain" culture is pissing me off. Labour hiking taxes on alcohol while the Tories are threatening to double duty on drinks such as super strength lager and cider while leaving their favourite tipples like malt whisky and fine wines untouched.
Sometimes more balance is needed in the argument. It's not all about pissed up idiots knocking seven shades of *** out of each other after downing 20 shots on a Saturday night. And Channel 4's documentary The Red Lion, which aired last Thursday, captured this beautifully.
Part of the Cutting Edge series, The Red Lion film, directed by award-winning documentary maker Sue Bourne, was an entertaining and, at times, moving snapshot of some of the characters that populate the thousands of Red Lion pubs around the UK.
We saw old ladies who needed their pub as a refuge against loneliness, a tee-total women's darts team in Scotland, a rugby team and a ladies hockey team who used their Red Lion pubs as places to drink heavily and a character called "Reg the Hedge" so called because "There's a very large hedge down my way and a couple of times, I actually fell in it. I fell in one time and couldn't find my way out."
A real mix of people who showed that the life of the British pub is vibrant and (Reg and the rugby boys aside) not all about getting as smashed as possible. And the close of the film, which showed the impact on people when their pub has shut down, illustrated that everything should be done to save the local. So check out The Red Lion on 4oD if you get chance.
