The 4% decline takes total alcohol duty receipts for the provisional 2025 to 2026 financial year to date to £7 billion.
Receipt for the period showed that alcohol duty from wine and other declined by £100 million (4%), duty from beer sales declined by £59 million (3%), while receipts from cider increased by £30 million (21%).
Spirits were the hardest hit category with duty declines of £156 million (7%). The fall in revenue follows an increase of 17% imposed on spirits since 1 August 2023.
In November, the UK chancellor announced that alcohol duty would rise in line with the Retail Price Index.
At the time, chief executive of the WSTA, Miles Beale, said: “This Budget has been dubbed a death by a thousand cuts, and for wine and spirit businesses those cuts run deep.
“Despite the Office for Budget Responsibility at last acknowledging that higher prices lead to a decline in receipts, the Government fails to recognise that its own policy is driving up those prices. Amazingly, the Treasury continues to press ahead with its ill-founded plan to pile further duty increases on alcohol.”
