John Mann MP has set up a Bassetlaw Youth Alcohol Panel to consider the issues surrounding alcohol abuse and young people. The Panel are a group of young people from John Mann’s constituency and today they launched a Public Inquiry into the issue.

Opening the Young People’s Inquiry, 17 year old Miss Kiara Owen called for a better balance in the media and compared the negative coverage of young peoples lives to their reporting of the positive aspects of young peoples involvement in the community.

The panel are currently questionioning the Chief of Nottinghamshire Police, the Government’s Drugs Minister, a local journalist and health representatives on the problem of alcohol misuse amongst their peers.

As part of a wider investigation that will ultimately result in a report that John and the young people plan to present to Government, the panel will try to ascertain what problems are both caused and faced by young people with regard to alcohol abuse, as well as how perceptions are fuelling potentially unfair media reporting.