When I am Queen I am going to sort out this problem. I'd also do away with the whole proxy sale nonsense as well. And require all staff selling age restricted products to be over 18 so you don't have to hang around while they ask for a transaction to be approved.
Good idea, but, what I think would be a better idea, your Highness, would be that people are held responsible for their own actions around buying age restricted products instead of the shop/person selling it having all the risk?
Because that's why retailers and their workers are so careful and restrictive, because if something goes wrong, they're the ones who get hauled over the coals and then it's all "The shop has a policy! There's laws around this! The staff broke the policy, the staff broke the law, their fault!".
I don't sell things like medicine, only alcohol, and I really don't want to be responsible for other people's behaviour when they're buying and using alcohol and in all honesty, why should I be? Unfortunately though, licencing says I am, that I have to sell it responsibly or I'm breaking the terms of the licence and maybe the law as well (breaking licence terms can still attract fines and restrictions placed on the licence even if no law is actually broken) and I don't see why I should have to risk that because someone else wants something. Let them drink themselves into a stupor, let them get into fights, let people get falling down drunk, cause mayhem, end up in a cell or hospital bed, buy it for the 13 year old they're with and have them do the same and take responsibility for it themselves instead of me having to because I sold it. Let them have the up to £25k fines and 6 months in prison threat, let them have the threat of losing their job because of their own behaviour, let them have the witch hunt after them when a group of teenagers getting pissed causes havoc and makes the local residents lives a misery.
I'd definitely support that! I don't want to be responsible for other people and their behaviour, in the same way a person selling a house can't be blamed for it being used as a drugs den, or a person selling a car can't be blamed for it being driven badly or by someone without a licence or insurance, let's make sure the people buying and using these age restricted things are the ones responsible for them when it goes wrong. Gets my vote!