British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was heckled during his visit to the Great British Beer Festival in London. Sunak was at the event on Tuesday, August 1, to promote changes to the country’s alcohol tax. The new rules raise the duty levied on the sale of some alcoholic drinks. As Sunak poured some beer to promote the modifications to the alcohol duty regime, a person shouted at the Conservative Party leader, “Prime Minister, oh the irony that you’re raising alcohol duty on the day that you’re pulling a pint.”

According to a Guardian report, the objection came from Rudi Keyser, who runs a pub in Wimbledon. The 46-year-old wanted to highlight the fact that while Sunak was promoting a freeze on beer-based duty, some other drinks were not taken into consideration. Watch:

Rishi Sunak has been heckled during a visit to a beer festival where he was seeking to promote a shake-up of the alcohol duty regime that will increase taxes on a range of drinks.#RishiSunak #BeerFestival #UnitedKingdom #WorldNews pic.twitter.com/PsWfo7Xsgs

— News18 (@CNNnews18) August 2, 2023

At the Great British Beer Festiva, Sunak helped pull a pint made by the Wensleydale brewery, which is located in his constituency, Yorkshire. He was asked by GB News to name his favourite pub and the Prime Minister explained that he was a teetotaller.

The changes brought in by Sunak’s government will raise the duty on alcohol overall, particularly on wine and spirits. But the tax on lower-alcohol drinks and most sparkling wines will fall, as per the BBC. The taxes levied on draught pints will not change and an additional measure will reduce the duty to a lower rate than that on supermarket beer.

However, Rudi Keyser, who heckled the PM, believes the reduction in some duties to be “smoke and mirrors.” He told the media, “It’s robbing Peter to pay Paul. So, across the board, it’s all going up.”

The incident comes in the light of the Prime Minister’s Office announcing that Rishi Sunak would go on his first family holiday in almost four years. This will be his first family vacation since Sunak became the Chief Secretary to the Treasury in 2019. The British Prime Minister will be accompanied by his wife Akshata Murty and their two daughters on the week-long trip.

The destination of the British Prime Minister’s vacation has been kept secret for security reasons. Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden will take charge of the day-to-day government business over the course of Sunak’s week-long holiday, as per news agency PTI.

(Edited by : Sudarsanan Mani)