There are now enough "drinking outlets" in the State, according to the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, who yesterday launched a report which showed a dramatic increase in the consumption of alcohol in Ireland.
The interim report of the Strategic Task Force on Alcohol sho- wed a 41 per cent increase in the amount of alcohol drunk in 1989 and 1999, at a time when consumption dropped in 10 other EU countries.
The consumption of spirits had risen by more than 50 per cent in the past six years and cider sales had doubled.
The report makes a number of recommendations, including re- ducing per capita consumption by "regulating availability", increas- ing taxes and reducing advertising.
At the launch in Dublin the Minister said the "number of outlets is a key point" and legislation introduced by the Government to extend licensing hours would have to be reviewed.
"Market forces versus public health issues have to be confronted once and for all," he said.
The Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise was last night unavailable for comment about the impact this would be likely to have on competition laws.
Mr Martin said there was reportedly a pub for every 290 people in the State and the task force's report had shown that the more outlets there were, the more alcohol was drunk.
"I have no agenda with pubs or pub licensing. My agenda is a public health one," he said. "The experts here tell us and the experience internationally was, that the greater the availability, the greater the consumption, and the greater the consumption the greater the harm."
He also challenged the social partners to get involved by agreeing to remove alcohol and cigarettes from the consumer price index, so that they would not affect inflation.
The drinks industry was represented on the task force and issued a "minority" report which ran contrary to the report's findings. The Minister said he did not accept the minority report and that he would be bringing the recommendations of the task force to Government.
One of those majority recommendations is to increase taxes. This is the single biggest thing the Government could do to curtail alcohol consumption, according to a public health specialist.
"It is not a popular option," said Dr Joe Barry, a member of the Strategic Task Force on Alcohol."But this country has to get real about the issue."
In 2000 the average per adult consumption of pure alcohol in Ireland was 14.2 litres compared to an EU average of 9.1 litres.
Dr Barry, who is medical adviser to the National Drugs Strategy Team, said the level of increase had been dramatic. Dr Barry, who is involved in setting up regional drugs task forces, said that everywhere "alcohol is the issue. It needs to be much more regulated."
He said it was "shocking" that Ireland's alcohol consumption had risen by 41 per cent. In the four other EU states where consumption had increased - Portugal, Germany, Greece and Britain - the increases were less than 5 per cent.
Father Mícheál MacGréil of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association and the editor of Reality magazine, said a lack of leisure alternatives to pubs for young people in Ireland had exacerbated the problem of over-consumption.
He suggested that perhaps the answer lay in "creating special alcohol units of the gardaí, similar to those already in use for illegal drugs. The gardaí need more resources in order to be effective on this issue."
Dr Mick Loftus, a former president of the GAA and a coroner in Mayo for nearly 30 years, has blamed alcohol misuse for social ills such as suicides, road accidents and "devastation of families". Dr Loftus also believes that alcohol advertisements at sporting events should be prohibited.
Mrs Gertie Shields, a spokeswoman for Mothers Against Drinking and Driving (MADD), believes "more enforcement of legislation already in place" is needed. She said "there need to be more random breathalyser tests on the roads, which would scare more people out of driving drunk".
The recommendations include:
•regulating alcohol availability by raising taxes and health board interventions on pub licensing;
•protecting children by limiting advertising, controlling where ads are placed and banning alcohol sponsorship of children's events;
•enforcing laws preventing publicans from serving drunk people.