Drinking age and restrictions and all them bloody nonsence questions at the shops (UK)?

Whats all this "prove your age if you look under 25" i mean isn't this a bit stupid. When I go out shopping or for a night out on the town I really don't fancy taking out a driving licence or pport or flashing such items in a shop or bar. I mean I remember i used to go weekly shopping and pick up a packet of cigarettes or bottle of wine but now i get the full " air port check" but instead of " did you pack this bag yourself sir" I get the " have u got any id sir". This pathetic new length to stop people under 18 getting hold of alcohol is totally ridiculous, is it really going to stop kids wanting a drink when " Cindy " at check out wines in the most irritating voice " got any id". I mean doesn't it just beg the logic of people just getting other people getting the booze and cigarettes for them, I am sure buying the stuff them self's is allot more safe than getting the towns " Dodgy Dave" to pick them up stuff. All these age restriction things have always bothered me, I went into full time work at 16 and I had my own responsibility's but I couldn't drink what is with that. I remember when I was a kid and I couldn't get alcohol easily so me and my friends used to save up loads of money and for like a once a month event we got 1 booze trip done and went mad on drinking in a park, i mean that isn't safe is it but the way the governments going were gonna have more people 16/17 rolling around drunk in parks and if they manage to get the drinking age up to 21 we will have 18,19 and 20 year olds waiting outside shops haring people going in to buy them booze. I mean this whole age thing in this country is giving a very odd message to younger people, oh its fine to go out have , move out, join the army, get married, go into full time employment but no drinking. People wonder why there are so many teen pregnancy's, my guess is that is probably they only fun thing they can do without getting hared by police, and its true. Most kids around my area will probably just get their drug dealers to go into the shop for a few bottles of vodka while their picking up their weed lol Why cant we give kids more responcibilitys over their lifes and maby they wont mess up as bad. The buying age of alchohol has been 18 for about 40 to 50 years I think, and I think the way that law was inforced was fine but now they are making it such a forbidden fruit its making itself more glamorous. I think alchohol should have the same kind of inforcement as smoking, you can smoke anywhere ( as long as its not in a public inclosed area) at any age but need to be a certain age to buy them and not get hinderd by the law. I think if some one is drinking and acting like a prat and being disorderly they should be delt with the law but if anyone is drinking and being perfectly social they should be left well alone, maby we can stop this fasination with alchohol with the kids and make it more of a normal all available thing like a soft drink and they wont see it as such a big thing. Its life coffee its readly available but you dont see all the kids geting their older friends to buy them a tub of nescafe and a portable kettle with a few mugs and take it up to the woods, and belive me if cafine had an age restriction there would be 100s of kids drinking it just for the sake of it being forbidden. What are you views people?