CLIVE SMITH: Scots will still get cheap booze, but from bootleggers

A can of four per cent lager that cost £1 previously will now cost £2. A crate of 10 will now cost £20. Goodbye decent deals at the supermarket. Barbecue season will never be the same again in Scotland. But unless Nicola Sturgeon plans on making a hard border with checks on vehicles crossing country lines I can’t see this working. Maybe she’s planning a bit of maintenance on Hadrian’s wall. Surely this will just kick-start bootlegging operations with Al Capones popping up all over the gaff with vanloads of booze crossing from England into Scotland. Carlise will become like Calais was in the 1990s, booze runs to warehouses full of cheap booze south of the border. This is just another one of those nanny state,‘for your own benefit’ taxes – simply another way for the government to get more money from the people. A lot of these things are tested in Scotland first, so how long before it makes its way into England? Bringing in this tax is supposed to help save 400 lives per year. It won’t though will it? It will just make things worse. If people want alcohol and can’t afford it they will get it from somewhere. Cheap imports from abroad laced with anti-freeze or some home-made moonshine from a distillery cobbled together up in the Highlands. And just watch the death toll rise. The price of smoking has rocketed, but this hasn’t stopped those who love a fag from quitting, they just buy cheap knock-off from China with god knows what in it from a bloke in the Dog and Duck. Businesses will close, unemployment will rise, alcoholic parents will need to find the extra money for their Frosty Jack from somewhere. These ideas seem all well and good in the board or cabinet room but in practice do they ever really work? RIP MR WOO So our cat died this week. As with many cats he met an untimely end on the road. It’s the first time the kids have dealt with any death. They all coped with it differently and we were discussing what to do as way of remembering him in the garden. One of the kids said: ‘Why don’t we get him stuffed?’ Apparently ‘granny has a stuffed koala in the loft’! I can’t say I ever remember noticing any stuffed animals about the house when I was younger. Maybe the old man had a secret hobby? Not only is he a dab hand at DIY but a taxidermist too. Who knew? Anyway, seeing Mr Woo (the cat’s name not my dad’s) standing on the mantelpiece when I’m dunking a digestive is not something I really fancy to be honest. AGONY ADVICE FROM A SIX-YEAR-OLD The missus went on her phone and in the search history she discovered ‘dumping boyfriends’. I’ve got two girls at secondary school and one that will be starting junior school in September. So, you’d think this would have something to do with the older two. Wrong. On questioning, a little mischievous grin told us it was our six-year-old! Apparently, it wasn’t for her though... She spun us some likely story about looking it up for a friend. I’ve heard better lies. Thinking about it now still makes me laugh, a six-year-old looking up relationship advice on Google. How things have changed in the playground since the days of hopscotch and What’s The Time Mr Wolf? At least when the older ones start getting boyfriends they’ll be able to go to their little sister for advice!