Assessing the Early Impact of Minimum Pricing for Alcohol on the Wider Population of Drinkers

In May 2018, Welsh Government issued a specification for an evaluation that would assess the process and impact of the introduction of a minimum price for alcohol (MPA) in Wales. The contract was split into four ‘lots’: (1) a contribution analysis, (2) work with retailers, (3) qualitative work with services and service users, and (4) an assessment of impact on the wider population of drinkers.

Three of the contracts (1, 3 and 4) were awarded to a consortium of researchers based at the University of South Wales, Glyndwr University Wrexham and Figure 8 Consultancy . The work with retailers contract was awarded to the National Centre for Social Research. This report focuses on the assessment of impact on the wider population of drinkers and presents findings from research conducted nine months post-implementation of MPA in Wales (henceforth the second wave of the evaluation). The findings provide an important account of the early impact of MPA on drinkers in the wider population as well as the impact of COVID-19 and lockdown.

This report is based on data collected from qualitative interviews conducted with members of our longitudinal study sample.