Bury South MP Christian Wakeford has renewed calls for a national alcohol strategy after the tragic death of his brother who suffered from addiction.

The Labour politician has been asking for such plan in recent years but has been left disappointed by the response from the government.

Mr Wakeford’s older brother, Mark Jones, died when his car flipped onto its roof on the M65 in February 2015.

The 44-year-old father-of-two was an engineer who grew up in Fence, near Burnley.

Speaking to GB News about why he wants an alcohol strategy, Mr Wakeford said: “For me it was a personal tragedy that got me working on alcohol harm because just over seven years ago I got the knock on the door by the police to tell me that my brother had died.

“It turned out he had been suffering from alcohol addiction. He’d been in hospital to try an overcome some of that.

"He tragically died in a car crash while over the limit.

“From my perspective, it was to make sure no-one else goes through what me and my family did do. It did tear the heart out of the family.”

Mr Wakeford stressed that when talking about addiction, no-one chooses to be an addict, but recent figures have shown an increase in alcohol-related deaths and disorders.

He said that in the last couple of years there has been a 20 per cent rise in alcohol-related deaths, an 11 per cent increase in deaths of mental disorders due to alcohol and a 15 per cent increase in deaths due to fatal alcohol poisoning.

Mr Wakeford added: “What we are asking for is more information on alcohol labels so that people can be truly informed about what they are consuming and ideally a change to the Equality Act so that there can be employment support for those who are suffering from addiction.”

In response, a Department of Health and Social Care Spokesperson said: “Alcohol misuse can ruin lives and destroy families, and we are committed to supporting those most at risk, which is why we have a 10-year strategy in place to address drug and alcohol-related harms.

“As part of this, we’ve provided £532m of new funding over three years to rebuild drug and alcohol misuse treatment and recovery services in England, including funding to increase the availability of inpatient detoxification beds.

“We have set up the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities to level up and address the long-standing health disparities that exist in many areas, including in relation to alcohol-related health harms.”