Pernod Ricard criticises new UK alcohol guidelines

To accept the UK’s newly reduced alcohol guidelines would be “counterintuitive”, says Pernod Ricard UK’s managing director Denis O’Flynn, who has suggested that the company might be forced to refrain from putting such messages on bottles altogether.

Denis O’Flynn, managing director of Pernod Ricard UK

Speaking at a round table event in London yesterday, O’Flynn said the company had a “serious issue” with the latest guidelines, which have seen the recommended consumption levels for men reduced to the same level as women, but also include the message that there is “no safe level” of drinking.

“We are all about responsible drinking, but the idea of there being no sensible level, that jars with us”, said O’Flynn.

Led by England’s chief medical officer Dame Sally Davies and published in January, the draft report claimed that any amount of drinking increases the risk of a range of cancers and that there was “no safe level” of drinking. The report lowered the recommended intake for men by seven units to the same level as women – just 14 units per week – which equates to around six pints of 4% strength beer or six 175ml glasses of 13% abv wine.

Last month, the UK government formally accepted the new guidelines. While the language of the report was toned down to acknowledge that alcohol plays a key part in the social lives of many, it maintained the message that such activity carries a degree of risk, reinforcing its message that there is “no safe level” of drinking.

“In essence the guidelines put consumption limits for both males and female at the same level. Physiologically I’m not sure about that”, said O’Flynn. “The guidelines have been softened to recognise moderate and responsible drinking but a statement still remains within those guidelines which says that there is no safe level of alcohol consumption. We don’t accept that position and so we are going to have to consider how to communicate with consumers. For us to accept that there’s no safe level of consumption is counterintuitive”, added O’Flynn.

O’Flynn suggested that one way for approaching this would be to take some guidance currently included on bottles voluntarily off packs and place them instead on an off-bottle portal for consumers to access.

Both the WSTA and The Portman Group, which oversees the promotion of responsible drinking in the UK by the trade, have criticised the new guidelines. Henry Ashworth, chief executive of The Portman Group, said that it was “regrettable” that the guidelines still make reference to the view that there is “no safe level of drinking”.

Previous NHS guidance, published in 1995, advised that men should not drink any more than three to four units a day – up to 21 units a week – while women should not drink more than two to three units a day, or up to 14 units a week. Confirming the changes, the government said the revised guidelines were intended “not to prevent those who want to drink alcohol from doing so,” but to provide people with information to help navigate potential risks and make decisions about their consumption.

The UK is now one of just six countries in the world that recommend the same levels of alcohol intake for both men and women.

The event, held in London yesterday, marked O’Flynn’s last. He is stepping down from the role of managing director of Pernod Ricard at the end of this month after 16 years with the company.

Summing up his time at the company, O’Flynn said he felt that Pernod Ricard’s newly decentralised model had “worked really well”.

“If I were to reference two things in the context of my time here it was to get clarity around the strategy which is ’shaping the nations drinking experiences’ and the whole idea around drinking experiences. That is now the market place that we want to play in. The other area that I think works is to ask for forgiveness and not permission. I think sometimes we can take life a little too seriously and we have to remember we are in the leisure business,”  said O’Flynn.