VICTORY FOR COMMON SENSE (AND THE TRUST!) IN BANNING ALCOHOL SPONSORSHIP ON CHILDREN'S STRIPS

A deal struck between the Scottish Executive and the alcohol industry will see an end to the despicable sight of childen and infants advertising alcohol across their tiny chests. The deal reported in the weekend's press will bring about something which the Trust has been arguing for for years with the directors of Celtic. Since the beginning of the Carling deal, the Trust representatives have been arguing long and hard with Celtic to remove all alcohol advertising from strips intended for those who are, themselves, too young to legally drink alcohol. We argued vociferously that, while we had no problem with alcohol or with advertising, it was simply wrong for a club (especially one with Celtic's family orientation and strong moral traditions) to agree any deal with a sponsor which required them to use children in this way. In reponse we were told that a) it was difficult to separate out childrens' from adult's sizes at the top end of the underage range (presumably they feared that some wee adults would not be able to advertise Carling for them) and b) that parent's had to be given the choice (again presumably to use their children's bodies to sell more beer for Coors). Eventually they agreed to produce some unbranded strips, but as anyone who has ever tried to buy one will know they were made available only to those who a) knew they existed b) was willing to continually badger staff to get one. In addition, their failure to release new unbranded strips on the same day as the rest meant that many children, for whom getting them immediately puts them ahead with their friends, were wearing the branded strips early on. Those children who were then given unbranded strips were made to feel like second-class citizens with many of their peers accusing them of having strips that were not 'official'. Not all strips were available in an unbranded version in any case.

This new deal will come as a great relief to those parents who either did or did not give in to pressure from their children, who will now be able to buy only unbranded strips for their children with no argument.

It is just a pity that Celtic PLC did not show greater leadership in this area by making this move on their own accord some years ago.