Last Saturday night I decided to go and buy a loaf of bread. Since I live in the centre of town and don’t own a car, this was a challenge in itself but that’s definitely a theme for another day. What it meant, however was that I came face to face with the reality of what our night-time city centres are really like.

No, there weren’t clusters of ‘hoodies’ dealing drugs or ladettes urinating in the street or any of the clichés of the tabloid town-centre but there was a very odd atmosphere. Everyone but me seemed to be devoted to the single-minded pursuit of the cheapest available route to drunkenness in the shortest possible time. So far, so Daily Mail, but look around. What else is there to do?

Unlike most European countries, British towns and cities provide very few options for the young at night. The shops are shut; you can rarely get a coffee or soft-drink for love or money, still less a table at which to drink it and any meal or snack beyond a Snickers bar is out of the question. Is it any wonder Britain’s youth are world champion binge-drinkers. There is literally nothing else available.

When young people crowd into large towns, the first question has to be – “Why are they coming?” To answer that, go to your local suburban shopping arcade and try to find so much as even that chocolate bar after 7pm, never mind the continental pavement café of myth and legend. Youth clubs? Sporting facilities? Forget it. If I want to do anything with my evening, the town centre is the only place to go.

It isn’t even that there are too many bars and clubs – towns with one or two venues can have just as much trouble with anti-social behaviour as those with dozens or hundreds –so the banning instincts of some not-so-liberal Liberals are not going to get us anywhere. So what do we do?

Well first of all – let’s stop making the problem worse. If you close down your seating area at 11 pm, your takeaway can stay open later than if you allow your customers to eat in. So immediately we are funnelling people back onto the street, at best to loiter and litter and at worst to vomit and fight. For goodness sake, let the people sit, eat and process their discount lager.

How about designating areas where cafés, snack-bars and small shops are encouraged to open late and catch the evening trade? The necessary extra lighting and a small police presence would more than pay for itself.

Many councils own halls and community spaces in town centres and in the suburbs: Let’s invest in young people by providing something to do at the weekend, whether it’s drama or music or just somewhere to go and buy a panini. Again, it costs money but it could drastically cut the need for remedial policing and bring immeasurable benefits to the community.

We’ve designed binge-drinking and anti-social behaviour into the fabric of our towns and cities by taking away every alternative and turning them into one-stop shops for alcohol and disorder. We scapegoat the young people our society has failed, calling them yobs and hoodies and now we’ve even come up with ultrasonic gadgets that scare off anyone under 25 like we were moles in the lawn. Then we’re surprised when some youngsters opt out of voting, engaging or even caring what the rest of society does.

Britain’s youth is targeted and persecuted in ways no other segment of society would tolerate without riots in the street; is it any wonder kids turn to drink?

This is a clear case of Britain needing a Liberal alternative to the Get-Tough consensus only concerned with headlines and the votes of Middle-England marginals. Which will be the first Lib Dem council brave enough to say that the way to tackle the crisis amongst the young in our towns and cities doesn’t only extend to banning things and take meaningful action? Lest anybody forget, the disenfranchised youth of today are the voters of tomorrow. What is the outlook for a future Britain inhabited by the adults these young people will become?

* Benjamin Mathis is Chair of London Liberal Democrat Youth & Students, and has been a party member since 2005.