Increasing prices doesn't solve problems. People just find cheaper substitutes. Question should be asked as to how handout cash can be spent by recipients. And this comment isn't race specific and doesn't just relate to alchohol. As we rapidly move away from the use of cash and most transactions are card based surely restrictions can be placed on the type of goods and services which taxpayer funded spending can be used for.
Great outcry no doubt with the standard response of "nobody can tell me what to spend me money on". But its surely time to update people's thinking to recognise that it isn't their money until we the people give it to them. We give it to people in our society to ensure they can eat, be clothed, sheltered, and we even provide free medical care to help them be healthy. Nowhere is it written that these self imposed community obligations for food, clothing, shelter etc can be substituted by the intended recipient in pursuit of whatever personal vices they may chose, beit cigarettes, alchohol, illicit drugs, or whatever.
The community only hands out cash because historically it was impractical to do otherwise on such a large scale. This system has been taken advantage of and now some recipients think its their right to do whatever they want with the money simply because they always got away with it. Some simply can't help themselves due to addiction, and giving them discretion isn't the sort of help that is best for them.
All citizens of legal age should have the same right to spend their earned money however they feel appropriate (after their obligations are met), but should handouts for a specific purpose really be given the same freedom? Forgetting the implementation practicalities for one moment, in principle can't we better help people by being more purposeful in how we help? If people have to do at least some work in order to earn a little income to give them discretionary spending money, surely it would at least start to bring balance and meaning to some in the community that otherwise sit outside the system. Surely it would stimulate some local economic activity in remote locations as a bonus.
There are exceptions to every rule so this conversation largely applies to those of working age. There is no perfect answer that will instantly fix the problem or that won't create outcry from significant numbers but sometimes we need to look at the source of problems rather than adding complexity through additional layers.
PS. Some stiff penalties for those vendors / businesses who saught to offer substitution type scams to bypass the rules should in order also.
