AC: We are a non profit organisation that exists to help retailers prevent underage sales. We do that by operating the UK’s largest proof of age scheme and we have issued 1.9m cards now to people of all ages, though most are 18 to 24. We have also operated the No ID No Sale campaign for the last five years.

AT: What do they use the cards for?

AC: To prove they are old enough to buy alcohol, tobacco, fireworks, solvents, knives, restricted DVDs and games, and to get into 18 admission cinema.

 AT: It seems to be a very widespread and successful campaign. How many retailers are involved in it?

 AC: I can’t give a precise figure, but you are right, it is now extremely widespread. You will see the message displayed, for example, across the top of the Gallaher tobacco gantry, and we have also produced over 225,000 retail packs to give shopkeepers signage for windows, and counter help for staff to get across the message that shops are required to check young people’s ID before selling age restricted products.

AT: Independents can face violence and abuse for refusing a sale. Do you agree with the view held by a significant number of independent retailers that they are being scapegoated for the problem of underage drinking?

 AC: Absolutely. The focus has been far too much on catching the shopkeeper out. Alcohol misuse by young people is actually a much wider problem than is solveable even if every single retailer never sold to anyone under 18.

AT: The Scottish government wants to set a minimum price for alcohol to discourage binge drinking and also underage drinking. What is your view?

AC: I question whether minimum pricing of alcohol would actually prevent that. We know that a lot of young teenagers get their alcohol from parents and friends so my guess is making the alcohol more expensive won’t affect the situation that much. The other point is that alcohol is only one of a set of risk-taking behaviours - smoking, unsafe sex, bad eating and obesity, bullying - a whole raft of issues from which the nation and therefore politicians choose to be concerned about. The idea that having a pop at retailers is going to fix all this damaging behaviour that young people engage in is simplistic and naïve. Alcohol misuse is part of a much wider issue and needs to be tackled far more widely and measures need to be proportionate.

AT: What more can be done to prevent underage sales in shops?

 AC: The key thing on preventing sales to children is better funded staff training and that’s an area I think government should get involved in rather than say, as now, that this is an area for industry. While the multiples will always be able to fund training, for independents it is a lot tougher.

AT: Some retailers display Challenge 21 messages in their stores, communicating to customers that they will ID anyone who looks 21 or under when they buy age restricted products. Do you support that initiative?

AC: Very much so. The Challenge 21 message has been very successful.

AT: What advice would you give to a retailer who is concerned that his local trading standards department simply wants to catch as many retailers out as possible?

 AC: If their local trading standards department can’t be bothered getting in touch with them to work co-operatively, then I would advise the retailer to get in touch with the local trading standards department and say we want to play ball on this, what is the advice, what is the scale of the problem in my area?

AT: As you said earlier, the stakes are high. Retailers do not want to make an underage sale because they have so much to lose. So do you feel trading standards officers can be over zealous in trying to convict them for an offence that is so rarely deliberate?

AC: I think one of the problems with all this enforcement is that even though it is being financed by the department of health or home office or whoever, one of the problems is that how it is done locally depends on the individual trading standards department. So how the London borough of Wandsworth does its test purchasing, for example, will be different to how the London borough of Lambeth does it. I do know that some authorities are very aggressive and there is no question that they are trying to catch the retailers out. Many other trading standards departments are very good. They actually want to work with the retailers and I would say that, as a minimum, what trading standards departments should be doing is giving their retailers fair warning that there will be exercises, explaining the procedures and what is expected and giving them information on how they can avoid getting into trouble. Simply going undercover, sending kids in and waiting for the retailer to trip up is not fair. But we don’t live in a fair world and if an authority wants to work on the basis of how many retailers it can catch out, how many prosecutions it can bring, then there is very little that anyone in the trade can do about it.

AT: Why do you think the focus is so much on the retailer?

AC: Because the retailer is an easy target. The shop doesn’t move. The shop is easy to watch. The youngster darting in and out and flying about is quite hard to get hold of, and if you collar a youngster and he hasn’t got any ID, it gets more complicated. So the first issue is making it as much an offence to try and buy the stuff as it is already an offence to try and sell the stuff to children.

 AT: Why hasn’t the government acted on this?

 AC: The government says it does not want to criminalise young people. So what the government is saying is that it is ok to criminalise retailers but we don’t want to criminalise young people in this regard – that it is a bit naughty if they try and buy cigarettes, but if we get evidence of it we will target the retailer. We think this is unfair. And we are not talking about putting the youngster in prison or even sending them to court for trying to buy tobacco. But, for instance, the fixed penalty system has begun to work for alcohol. It is an offence for an underage person to try and purchase alcohol and in many parts of the country the police are now handing out fixed penalty notices to 16 and 17 year olds for it. The point there is that it is a shared responsibility of the law.

 AT: Do you feel vindicated by its success?

AC: Yes, because the change of culture is palpable. When we were kids you didn’t expect to get ID’d. Even 10 years ago you didn’t. Now youngsters expect to be asked for ID. And the spin-off is that two million people have actually bothered to fill in an application form for a proof of age card. It has always been difficult for a retailer to look at a young person and guess their age, and you can’t do it by guesswork. If you are caught out, it’s on-the-spot fines, or worse still, prosecution, leading possibly to loss of a liquor licence, certainly a fine, not just for the manager but also for the individual member of staff and in the case of lottery, removal of the lottery terminal as well. So to have helped create a culture in which young people expect to be asked for ID is a major achievement - and it’s thanks to retailers. And every day there are hundreds of thousands of instances where retailers and their staff are preventing criminal offences and underage sales.

AT: Who actually thought up the No ID NO Sale campaign?

AC: It was thought up by the CitizenCard board. We dreamt it up collectively.