Police will tweet details of alcohol-related incidents and crimes taking place this weekend to provide an insight into the number of calls they receive.
Officers from Northamptonshire Police will tweet details from the force control room from 10pm until 4am on Saturday, May 25, and will cover 999 and 101 calls coming in through the evening, using the hashtag #alcoholharm.
Chief constable Adrian Lee, who is the ACPO lead for alcohol licensing and harm reduction, said: “We all recognise alcohol can be beneficial for our well being and community cohesion: sharing a drink with family, friends and neighbours in a pub, over dinner or at a summer barbecue is a social activity that has long been a part of British life.
“However, alcohol also causes damage that we cannot ignore. Excessive drinking clearly increases your likelihood of committing a crime or becoming a victim of one.
“Nearly 50 per cent of all violent crime is alcohol-related, drink-related anti-social behaviour is the most common form that people experience.
“Offenders are thought to be under the influence of alcohol in nearly half of all incidents of domestic abuse. The cost of policing all this is substantial and the impact on our partners, in particular the health service, is another huge cost.”
He added: “I do have concerns that a very small number of people come to our town centres intending to drink so much that they are not capable of taking personal responsibility for their own welfare. The police and other agencies do have a duty of care and together we do all we can to keep people safe, but there is a cost to that. I do wonder if the time has come for us all to become less tolerant of people who do not take personal responsibility for their own well-being and health.”