Projects & Research Partnerships

ExILEnS: Exploring the impact of alcohol licensing in England and Scotland

This project examined the impact of public health stakeholders' engagement in alcohol premises licensing on alcohol-related harms in England and Scotland.

Introduction

Local councils in England and Scotland have power over alcohol licensing, the system by which certain premises are allowed to sell alcohol. In the years preceding the ExILEnS project, public health teams became increasingly more involved in licensing processes and encouraging licensing authorities and licence-holders to act in ways they hoped would improve the health of the local population.

The ExILEnS project aimed to find out what actions the public health teams took, whether these had any impact on alcohol-related harms, and if their activities were worth the cost and effort.

Work packages

The project was split into four work packages (WP):

WP1: Local public health and licensing activity. This WP aimed to describe and explore public health team engagement in licensing, the local licensing regime, and related processes in 20 high activity and 20 low activity public health team (PHT) areas over the period 2012 to 2018.

WP2: Alcohol harms evaluation. This WP aimed to quantitatively evaluate whether public health engagement in licensing has a measurable impact on health harms and crime rates using routine data from 2009 to 2018.

WP3: Wider impacts, costs and distribution of effects. This WP examined implementation costs, estimated the short-term impact of PHT engagement in licensing on alcohol consumption and the longer-term impact of the intervention on health and healthcare costs, and explored the likely distribution of effects across the population.

WP4: Impact of findings. This WP had two key strands. Firstly to revise and refine hypothesised theories of change to qualitatively examine how PHT activities and key aspects of the licensing system may lead to changes in licensing outcomes and related harms. And secondly to synthesise and disseminate all findings, and identify recommendations for practice, policy and future work.

Research team

Chief Investigator: Niamh Fitzgerald, University of Stirling

Co-Investigators: Frank de Vocht, University of Bristol; Colin Angus, University of Sheffield; James Nicholls, Alcohol Research UK; Matt Egan, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM); Niamh Shortt, University of Edinburgh; Tim Nichols (formerly Brighton & Hove City Council) and Linda Bauld, University of Stirling.

Researchers: Richard Purves, Nathan Critchlow, University of Stirling; Nason Maani Hessari, Courtney Scott, LSHTM.

Collaborators: Aidan Collins/Jennifer Ruddick, Alcohol Focus Scotland.

Key project information

This study is funded by the NIHR Public Health Research programme (Award ID 15/129/11). The views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care.

Dates

April 2017 – March 2021

Funding

£836,011.69

Principal investigator

Professor Niamh Fitzgerald

Institutions involved

University of Stirling
University of Sheffield
University of Bristol
University of Edinburgh
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
Alcohol Research UK
Alcohol Focus Scotland

Key contact

sarg@sheffield.ac.uk

Papers

Fitzgerald N, Egan M, O'Donnell R, Nicholls J, Mahon L, de Vocht F, et al. (2024) Public health engagement in alcohol licensing in England and Scotland: the ExILEnS mixed-method, natural experiment evaluation [published online ahead of print 7 February 2024] Public Health Research DOI: https://doi.org/10.3310/FSRT4135

Fitzgerald N, Mohan A, Purves R, O'Donnell R, Egan M, Nicholls J, et al. (2024) Factors influencing public health engagement in alcohol licensing in England and Scotland including legal and structural differences: comparative interview analysis [published online ahead of print 7 February 2024] Public Health Research DOI: https://doi.org/10.3310/BGTR4277

O'Donnell R, Mohan A, Purves R, Maani N, Egan M, Fitzgerald N on behalf of the ExILEnS Consortium (2022) How public health teams navigate their different roles in alcohol premises licensing: ExILEnS multistakeholder interview findings [published online ahead of print 24 August 2022] Public Health Research DOI: https://doi.org/10.3310/XCUW1239

Fitzgerald N, Mohan A, Maani N, Purves R, de Vocht F, Angus C, Henney M, Nicholls J, Nichols T, Crompton G, Mahon L, McQuire C, Shortt N, Bauld L, Egan M (2022) Measuring how public health stakeholders seek to influence alcohol premises licensing in England and Scotland: the Public Health engagement In Alcohol Licensing (PHIAL) measure Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs DOI: https://doi.org/10.15288/jsad.22-00020

de Vocht F, McQuire C, Ferraro C, Williams P, Henney M, Angus C, Egan M, Mohan A, Purves R, Maani N, Shortt N, Mahon L, Crompton G, O'Donnell R, Nicholls J, Bauld L, Fitzgerald N (2022) Impact of public health team engagement in alcohol licensing on health and crime outcomes in England and Scotland: A comparative timeseries study between 2012 and 2019. The Lancet Regional Health – Europe DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lanepe.2022.100450

Fitzgerald N, Egan M, de Vocht F, Angus C, Nicholls J, Shortt N, Nichols T, Maani Hessari N, McQuire C, Purves R, Critchlow N, Mohan A, Mahon L, Sumpter C, Bauld L (2018) Exploring the impact of public health teams on alcohol premises licensing in England and Scotland (ExILEnS): protocol for a mixed methods natural experiment evaluation BMC Medical Research Methodology DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12874-018-0573-z