We are currently seeing a rerun, for the umpteenth time, of the old controversy about alcohol advertising. "Ban it altogether," says the anti-alcohol lobby. "Leave it to us to apply voluntary controls," says the drinks industry, writes Feargal Quinn.

Both arguments are, to my mind, fatally flawed.

A total ban suffers from the disadvantage that it cannot really be total. We can control media that originate within the State, but we have no control whatever over media that come from outside and yet are widely consumed by our citizens - whether by way of broadcasting, printed publications or the internet. That's like weather- proofing your front door while leaving your back door wide open to the elements.

It would put Irish-based media at a serious disadvantage in relation to their competitors, while (more importantly) failing in its declared aim of cutting off alcohol advertising messages from the consuming public.

On the other hand, however sincere the drink industry's plea that its long-term interest lies in moderate rather than excessive use of alcohol, to give it the watchdog role over publicising its own products is like putting the fox in charge of the chicken coop.

You only have to compare the considerable impact of its product advertising with the much lower impact of their propaganda in favour of moderate drinking. There is some evidence too that, over time, the "drink our product in moderation" message becomes effectively invisible to its audience, while conveniently remaining available to point to as proof of good intentions.

What seems undeniable is that even with the voluntary controls over the content of drink advertisements and the limited propagation of the message to drink moderately, the playing-field is anything but level.

No wonder the drinks industry wants to continue an existing regime that is akin to pitching a Premier League team against a third-division collection of semi- professionals.

I have a simple proposal which would genuinely level the playing-field between the forces at work here. It is, as you would perhaps expect from me, quintessentially a free-market approach. It certainly addresses the queasiness I always feel about trying to control social behaviour by banning things.

My idea is to impose a 100 per cent duty on all publicity expenses incurred by alcohol companies and to ring-fence that money in a fund that would be used by an independent body to put across the anti-alcohol message to the public.

"Publicity expenses" would cover not only advertising and promotional bills, but also the administrative costs each company incurs in running a marketing department. It would apply not only to Irish media spend but also to an appropriate proportion of what is spent on overseas media whose coverage spills over into this market.

At a stroke, this would achieve two things:

First, it would make available to those who put the argument against alcohol exactly the same level of resources as are available to those who promote drink products.

Second, since the anti-drink promotion would be controlled by an independent body, it would be free to highlight dramatically the downside of excessive drinking, something the present industry-sponsored promotion unsurprisingly finds itself unable to do.

Spending liable to the 100 per cent publicity duty would extend to sports sponsorship, which has reached enormous proportions as an incongruous way around the recent restrictions on direct advertising.

This would remove at least some of the moral dilemma that faces the GAA, which now must sup with the devil to get the resources it needs to develop its games. If it knew that every euro it received from the drinks industry was matched by a further euro to propagate the anti-drinking message, I imagine many conscientious people in the GAA would sleep better. Our present approach to this issue is just not working. Our dependence on drink consumption continues to increase, with negative effects on all aspects of our society.

The question is whether we have the courage to take a decisive step to reverse the process, before we are all too sozzled to do anything?

Feargal Quinn is an independent member of Seanad Éireann.