Alcohol and human rights

Even if employers impose a complete ban on alcohol this is unlikely to amount to a breach of human rights.

The General Medical Council said it would bar a doctor from medical practice unless he refrained from all alcohol and attended meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. The court held that this did not breach Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights as the ban on alcohol did not interfere with the doctor's right to a private life. He was still free to socialise in pubs as long as he did not drink alcohol. The ruling says there is "no authority to support the proposition that a ban on the consumption of alcohol is, per se, an interference with the right to respect for private life".

* Whitefield v GMC [2003] IRLR 39