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In Focus: The AFS monthly CEO blog - June 2026

In the second of a new series of CEO blogs, Carolyn Lochhead, chief executive of Alcohol Focus Scotland, reflects on Scotland’s football fans abroad and our reputation as big drinkers.

I’m writing this the week after Scotland beat Haiti: and what a week it is. We’re at the top of our group, and there’s a few days before our next game to enjoy the antics of the Tartan Army as they baffle Boston with their kilts, traffic cones and bagpipes.

It’s funny how football, more than any other sport, gets so tied up with how we see ourselves as a nation. I recall a conversation some years ago with an independence-supporting former MSP, who believed firmly that the one change which could tip a majority of people in Scotland into voting Yes was if FIFA ruled that we had to play as part of a UK-wide team.

I don’t know if that’s true. But the way in which international football brings so many of us together in shared hope, joy and despair does give us a chance to see how we collectively show up as a country. And there’s so much to love. Scotland fans are stoic. Good-natured. Adaptable. Goodness knows we’ve had to be all those things, over the years. We turn up wherever Scotland are playing, ready to have a good time, even when we lose. It’s a truly admirable approach.

But as well as our boundless optimism, we’re also known as serious boozers. That’s been demonstrated in many places over the last few weeks, as the World Cup frenzy has escalated. Film clips of US broadcasters greeting Scotland fans at the airport and discussing how much beer they had on the plane. The now-infamous Good Morning Britain segment in which Ed Balls portrayed the Monday bank holiday as time to recover from a hangover.  It’s not a great look: but our reputation is justified. We drink more per adult in Scotland than in England and Wales, and we’re dying from alcohol-specific causes at a higher rate than people in neighbouring England.

It’s something I’ve been reflecting on a lot since I took up the role of CEO at Alcohol Focus Scotland, back in February. Why is alcohol so embedded in our society? We celebrate with it, we drown our sorrows with it, we accept the effects on our health, sleep, wellbeing and productivity as if they are entirely normal parts of life.

In part it’s inheritance: this is how many of us saw our parents behave, so this is how we carry on. But traditions and behaviour can change – so why is alcohol the habit that prevails? Well, one reason is that it’s so hard to avoid. Alcohol adverts dominate our social spaces a lot of the time, and right now it’s everywhere, with drinks companies scrambling to associate themselves with the excitement of the World Cup. These ads present drink as fun, exciting, lively – with no mention of the immediate consequences of hangovers, anxiety and nausea, let alone the potential long-term effects of liver disease, strokes and cancer.

Take a look at a bottle of wine or a cocktail can and you’ll still be none the wiser. Our recent report with the Alcohol Health Alliance, A Clear Way Forward, looked at labels on over 500 alcohol products, and found that one in five of them didn’t meet voluntary guidelines on labelling. And basic nutrition and health information was inconsistent or wholly absent, leaving customers in the dark about what’s in their drink and what the health consequences might be of consuming it.

We launched A Clear Way Forward at Westminster earlier this month, and will return to the issue later in the year, when we expect the UK Government to consult on mandatory labelling standards across the UK. Knowing what we’re drinking and how it might affect us would be one small step to addressing our disastrous national relationship with alcohol. It’s exactly this kind of constructive, thoughtful campaigning that makes Alcohol Focus Scotland’s work so absolutely vital, and makes me feel very fortunate to lead such an essential charity. We know that long-term change is needed if we’re ever going create a healthier nation. It will be tough, but like this Scotland team, we’re determined to meet the challenge.