'We've built a society on alcohol but we need to think about whether that's actually the sort of society we want to be living in,' says broadcaster/comedian Hardeep Singh Kohli.

Did you see a drinking culture around you when you were growing up?
Up in Glasgow you can't avoid a drinking culture. And there's quite a big drinking culture in the Sikh community. I mean, to be able to bhangra dance, wearing a big turban and hold a pint of lager over your head, you have to come from a hardened drink culture. We are big drinkers. And that's sort of what I've railed against. This whole link between whether you're a man and whether you drink or not. I've sired two children, so I don't need to prove to anyone that I'm a man. Apart from my wife.

What was the scariest thing you saw in the course of making Hardeep Does Drinking?
We interviewed three girls from Bradford who were lovely, well brought up, polite girls. I think what shocked me more than anything was that they didn't think there were any problems associated with their drinking. Until you pushed them further and found out that one of them found herself in a rather dodgy situation with a strange man that could have turned nasty, one of them had a knife held to her throat, the other one can't wear high-heeled shoes because she broke both of her legs when she fell over drunk. I think there is a national denial going on about drink.

How much were they drinking in a session?
20 vodka and Red Bulls – on top of maybe a couple of bottles of wine. If I said to you that someone was spending a third of their disposable wealth on cannabis, you'd think 'that's worrying'. But these girls thought nothing of the fact that they were spending a third of their disposable income on alcohol, on one night out. It's a bit like the industrial revolution really, you're going to spend all week getting hammered in a factory and then spend Friday night getting hammered down the boozer. And it seems you need the drinking to take away from the reality of your life, and you need the reality of your life to pay for the drinking.

Initial stats haven't shown a big increase in drink-related crime since the licensing laws were changed. Does this tally with what you saw on the streets when you went out with the paramedics?
You can only drink a certain amount of alcohol. Even the girls in Bradford couldn't drink much more than they were currently drinking. So the changes in the law wouldn't affect them. The paramedics and the ambulence men in Colchester were quite upbeat just in terms of their own management of the situation. You weren't getting hotspots and it was easier for them to manage the flow of morbid alcoholics.

Have you ever been so drunk that you...

...lay down in the street?
No

...had a donner kebab?
No

...kissed a same-sex friend?
Yes. Twice.

...sung karaoke?
Yes

...showed off your bare backside?
No

...got arrested by the police?
No

...drove a car?
No

..ended up in hospital?
No

Is there any such thing as an 'addictive personality'? Do you have one?
I did have when I was younger but I trained myself out of it. There was one person we interviewed who was an alcoholic and addicted to fags. And he replaced those with a running addiction. He is now addicted to running. Sick Boy – the character in 'Trainspotting' – never became addicted [to heroin]. He could drop it as and when he wanted.

Would you be in favour of prohibition of alcohol?
There is no redeemable feature about cigarettes but there are however certain redeemable features about alcohol. It is a relaxant. I wouldn't be for prohibition. We've built a society on alcohol and we need to think about whether that's actually the sort of society we want to be living in.

The AA and other support groups describe alcoholism as a 'disease'. Do you agree that it's a disease in the same way that, say, cancer is a disease?
It's not a disease. It's an addiction. But it needs to be treated clinically, respected and treated as a disease. Does it really matter what it's called? Ultimately these people are just looking for something to give them credence and credibility. My problem is it exonorates people – 'It's not my fault I've got a disease!' No, you're an alcoholic, that's what you are. And you chose to do what you did. That sounds harsh but I've got an alcoholic uncle and I'm fed up with him and his excuses.

You spoke to a lot of young people in the course of the show. Do you think that they can be reached by government-type health campaigns?
I don't think that it's about the government. I think it's about families. France and Italy don't drink properly because the government have told them to drink properly. They drink properly because families drink properly in those countries. And that's what we have to deal with. We're just little islanders. You don't get Icelandic people walking down the street and having fights because they're drunk. We are screwed up. We need to be made aware of the facts of what this stuff is doing to us. I think we should all hang around hospitals at school. Or get your uncle drunk and make him go to the school disco with you.

Do you think you might have an alcohol problem? Test yourself

Get some advice

Have something to say about this article or binge drinking? Talk to other channel4.com users on our forum

Read PC David Copperfield's take on the subject of binge drinking.