Mr Robert Madelin
Director General DG Sanco
European Commission

Formation of a European Alcohol and Health Forum

  • Protect young people, children and the unborn child;
  • Reduce injuries and death from alcohol related road accidents;
  • Prevent alcohol-related harm among adults and reduce the negative impact on the workplace;
  • Inform, educate and raise awareness on the impact of harmful and hazardous alcohol consumption, and on appropriate consumption patterns;
  • Develop and maintain a common evidence base at EU level.

A cornerstone to implement the strategy is the adoption of a Charter establishing a EuropeanAlcohol and Health Forum. The objective of the Forum is to provide a common platform to all interested stakeholders at EU level that pledge to support actions relevant to reducing alcohol-related harm. Actions to include:

  • strategies aimed at curbing under-age drinking;
  • information and education programmes on the effect of harmful drinking and on responsible patterns of consumption;
  • possible development of efficient common approaches throughout the Community to provide adequate consumer information;
  • better enforcement of age limits for selling and serving alcohol;
  • interventions promoting effective behavioural change among children and adolescents;
  • cooperation to prevent irresponsible commercial communication and sales.

The Forum is to be chaired by the Directorate General for Health and Consumer Protection.The Forum’s membership will include participants drawn from umbrella organisations operating at European level, and member national organisations and individual companies provided all are ‘willing to engage in concrete and verifiable commitments under the Forum process’.

Members of the Forum will have to subscribe to certain principles which include, among other things, to:

  • Agree to the process and objectives set out in the Charter.
  • Provide detailed information on the commitments they make towards reducing alcohol-related harm, in the form of an action plan.

For each commitment, the action to be undertaken will indicate the level of relevant current activities in 2005/2006, as a baseline. The aim is that, going forward, Forum members agree to devote an increasing level of effort, beyond what is being done at present.

The action plans will have to indicate measurable objectives;who the owners of the commitments are; how the proposed action would contribute to reducing alcohol-related harm (relevance), the resources allocated to each commitment, a timetable for the implementation, and the dissemination approach to be undertaken. The action plans will be made public on the Commission's websites, and in publications.

Commitments from umbrella organisations at European level may include actions taken by all or part of their membership. Commitments for action at European level made within the Forum process may need to be implemented in agreement with national or local stakeholders, and in varying ways at national and sub-national level.

The Directorate General for Health and Consumer Protection will take steps under the Public Health Programme to facilitate the independent study of performance of at least some of the commitments implemented within the Forum process. In addition, the Directorate appears determined to get the commitments made by members of the Forum to be monitored in a ‘transparent, participative and accountable way’ with the involvement of all stakeholders in reviewing progress and outcomes. Members of the Forum have to agree on the necessity to monitor the commitments they make.

Task Forces Three task forces are to be set up:

Science
This will consist of a maximum of 20 experienced scientists encompassing both research and field work. The group is to stimulate cross EU networking of scientific activities; provide scientific guidance to the Forum, offer guidance on monitoring and evaluation on areas where action by Forum members would have potential for reducing alcohol related harm.Members of the group and experts will be required to file a standard declaration on conflict of interest.

Marketing
This again will consist of 20 people with no more than one member from each of the organisations represented on the Forum and a balanced representation of the different stakeholders will be ensured.The tasks of the group are:

  • to examine best practice actions aimed at preventing irresponsible marketing;
  • to examine trends in product development, product placement, sales promotions and other forms of marketing, and
  • to make any appropriate recommendations to the Forum.

Youth SpecificAspects of Alcohol
Protecting young people, children and the unborn child is the top priority identified in the Commission’s Alcohol Communication.

The task force will be drawn on a similar basis as the previous two.However, on representation there will be a particular emphasis on representative of youth and family organisations. The group’s tasks are:

  • to examine trends and drivers in drinking habits of young people and of the alcohol-related harm they suffer;
  • to examine approaches that have a potential to reduce the alcohol-related harm suffered by young people, and in particular strategies aimed at curbing under-age drinking and drink-driving by young people, actions aimed at promoting responsible selling and serving, and interventions aimed at educating and empowering young people;
  • to make any appropriate recommendations to the Forum.

The experience of young people themselves will be duly considered by the Task Force when carrying out these tasks.

The Forum will meet twice a year and will be chaired by the Directorate General for Health and Consumer Protection of the European Commission. The Chair will ensure that a cooperative and actionoriented approach is respected, and that the activities of the Forum are in line with the Charter and with EU established policies.

Open Forum
In order to give interested non-member bodies and organisations from the EU and beyond an occasion to follow the work of the Forum, and make their opinions known, an ‘Open Forum’ will be convened once per year.

A personal view by Joao Salviano, a youth member of the Forum

The Alcohol and Health Forum established by the European Commission is a step in the right direction and it establishes alcohol related harm as an EU priority.

It will be very easy to criticise a space that brings together all the stake holders, including the industry, to be consulted and brought onboard into EU’s policy making, but one must resist the temptation of criticising a Forum that actually improves the situation, creates a fair space for debate and dialogue, a space for compromise and a space that demands responsibility from its members over their own commitments,which is an innovative approach to this kind of political forum.

TheAlcohol and Health Forum is above all a master stroke by the European Commission that created a one way road to policy making in order to avoid episodes of a recent past where agreements were made in the room and immediately lobbied against in the corridors. The drinks industry representatives at the Roundtable Forum,organised by the European Policy Centre, agreed action which they later lobbied against before even the Commission published its Alcohol Strategy.

The rules are simple: you bring to the forum what you choose to bring, you decide your own commitments, and you will be held responsible for them once in the Forum. This means that the European Commission can now use the commitments and compromises made by the members of the Forum and translate them into EU policy without allowing the chance for backstage manoeuvres, for the Commission will from now on possess the evidence of the commitments and compromises in their hands, and not words in the wind like before.

The EU strategy onAlcohol Related Harm that came out last fall could be seen as weak and disappointing by many but the truth is that amidst the powerful influence of those that do not have a public health interest,which clearly watered down a strategy that should be in place long ago, a skilled Commissioner and an equally skilled Director-General were able to safeguard the minimum conditions for public health to prevail and for the strategy to remain a valuable tool in fighting the related harm caused by inappropriate alcohol consumption.

All that matters now to see is whether the Public Health NGO’s will be willing to take the lead and support the EU Commission by joining the Alcohol and Health Forum and once there by bringing their commitments forward in a manner that forces others who don’t share the same interests to step up as well and create a true coalition of stakeholders that by private or general interest can assist in the development of policies and programmes that can improve the dramatic situation that originates from the harmful consumption of alcohol.

The Alcohol and Health Forum and its membership is the living proof that alcohol is a serious social, economical and political problem, a priority to be tackled at EU level, and if not by anything else, this is sufficient reason to consider it a success already!