To think MPs shouldn’t be drinking while at work?

@maftaz @TheEyesOfLucyJordon thanks! Quick MN chatter, just off to pour out a double brandy before my 10:30 zoom call.

@Everanewbie

Well said.

It’s not acceptable, but neither is legalising all drugs. Does she think it would be fine for people to take drugs before or during work? How dangerous would it be if drugs were still in people’s systems from the weekend or the night before? Many drugs can remain in the body and affect people for longer than alcohol, impairing judgement, reaction times, coordination, and concentration well after use. Lunatic idea!

In comms / media agencies it used to be the norm, especially with the “creatives”. They used to come back giggling, half drunk and they charged the hour to some poor client. It was not ok, but it’s probably still the case.

@Everanewbie

Spot on!

point still stands

Magestically put 😍

No not really

Neither a drink or a drunk is acceptable at lunch time.

Re the drugs comments, I think that the current law does not work - and if it was regulated then the crimes around the drugs trade should also come down. We would also be able to ensure that people are getting a standardised amount and not cut to shit with drain cleaner.

A first knee jerk response is "thats terrible", but when you dig deeper in to the reasons it actually makes a lot of sense. People WILL do drugs, so lets protect them as much as we can (from themselves too!)

The Green Party has previously campaigned to decriminalise drug possession in the UK, with Spencer telling the BBC it was a “conversation that we need to have.”

In 2024, the party proposed the establishment of a regulated market, a position reaffirmed by leader Polanski during his leadership speech in October. On a visit to the Gorton and Denton constituency on Sunday 22 February, he said he would “legalise, regulate and control” all drugs under a “public health, evidence-based approach”.
“We have the worst amount of drug deaths in the whole of Europe,” he said. “I think that fact’s often missing from this conversation.”

The facts
According to Jones, drug seizures are at a “record high” under Labour, which is taking a “common sense approach” to tackling drug-related organised crime while “investing billions in drug prevention and treatment”.

Yet drug-related deaths are currently at a 30-year high, with reports of a four-fold increase in fatalities from synthetic opioids. More than 300,000 adults were registered with drug and alcohol treatment services in 2024, according to ONS figures.

Meanwhile, the illegal drug trade continues to fuel violent crime, disorder, and child exploitation. In England, the Children’s Society estimates that 46,000 children are being exploited by organised crime and recruited into “County Lines” gangs, with those living in more deprived areas particularly vulnerable.

Just start charging standard high street prices for the booze, as a first step.

So much rubbish on this thread. Of course airline pilots or heart surgeons can't drink on the job. But on occasion, people in office type jobs can, and do enjoy a pint or two on a lunchtime and continue to function. The two are not comparable and it is stupid to play the zero sum game on this. People talk like it is binary, go full Oliver Cromwell or go full Oliver Read.

I don't disagree that we should expect seriousness from our politicians, but there is a huge difference between having a pint or two waiting for a vote, and running government pissed up.

Whilst a full on drinking culture in the workplace is unhealthy, in my opinion the kind of po-faced puritanical attitudes on here are part of the real decline in people's happiness at work. Work is now more serious and sterile. We micro-manage, we spend more time working from home (a great thing for many, but it has detracted from culture) and we are obsessed with KPIs and think team bonding is based on a slice of pizza and virtual yoga sessions. The team cohesion and employee buy in of a Friday lunchtime pint far outweighs any slight tail of in productivity.

I’m a bit baffled as to why people think that because some professions ban lunchtime drinking, that all should.

It depends what you do, as to whether it’s a problem. Operating heavy machinery, performing surgery and jobs like that where precision is a must will of course enforce a strictly no alcohol policy, for obvious reasons. But the risks don’t apply uniformly to all occupations. So it makes sense that policy will vary.

Are you imagining they’re earnestly sitting there in the chamber mulling over matters of conscience and crunching data in their heads to work out which way to vote?

You’d be very much mistaken in that case! All they have to do is walk through the door their party whips tell them to. An inebriated trained chimp could manage it!

That’s not to say they don’t need their wits about them at any other time, but voting isn’t one of them. The way decisions get made is the ruling party sets out legislation and they vote on that in accordance with their party’s diktats. Dissent is rare and would be thought through in advance. Any brainwork is done in the civil service, ministerial offices and the MP’s offices.

https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/unelected-peers-guzzle-ps110000-worth-of-champagne-in-the-house-of-lords-in-2025-5456134

£110,000 on bubbly just in HoL

This issue has been rumbling on for years. I don't agree with the Greens on a lot of things although my politics are left wing, but I agree with them on this. Nobody needs to drink alcohol during the working day especially if their job just happens to be of national importance. And what other sector has an in-house bar subsidised by the tax payer? The whole operation runs at a loss of around £5.8m a year subsidised by us. As if that wasn't bad enough, it totally entrenches the "old boys club" and "snouts in the trough" entitlement of parliament which so many women have been trying to smash for decades. It really isn't going to kill these blokes to go without their subsidised booze is it.

I can see how drinking in an industry where entertaining clients is part of the role could be acceptable, and even encouraged. However that is not the case for MP's. It seems insane to me, that people who are involved in the running of the country can drink while they are working. I also don't get the comparison with people sleeping on a night shift, given sleep is a basic human need, which is needed to function. Only alcoholics need alcohol to function, and I would hope our MP's are not that!

Agreed! It's normal in my sector.

As we know, they were at it during lockdown, having drunken orgies, when they should have been social distancing, and cowering at home saving their grannies, as they were ordering the rest of us to do.

I’m Irish and the biggest culture shock I had working in the UK was lunchtime drinking. It would not be done or tolerated in Ireland where drinking is pretty famously tolerated so I was pretty surprised to see it in the UK.

You said on a night shift. Not a 24 hour one.

It's not.

Is it a Wetherspoons 😉

I don't think it's very professional of them or a good look if it's a regular occurrence. Occasionally I have a glass of wine with a lunch at work when taking someone out, but not often these days. The other aspect is that their bar is heavily subsidised. Right to question certain MPs' behaviour IMO.

I want to be elected, or invited!

Same subsidies apply to other parliaments around the world. Being elected is a privilege you know, and must be rewarded in addition to their pay. They often sit for long hours into the night when the pubs are closed you know! ha ha.

Obviously no one wants their MP to be inebriated whilst at work, but why do people assume that the people she is talking about are MPs, who may have finished work and are stopping for a quick meal and drink before going home?
Frankly, her childish comments are just that - childish tittle-tattle. She’s gossiping. Personally I prefer my MP to be talking intelligently about the main issues that affect my community and the country generally - cost of living, NHS concerns, impact that wars around the world have on the UK, unemployment. I’m pretty sure there are ways and means of raising complaints about issues about MP behaviour in the HOC.

No. So what?