A War is Brewing: Why English whisky is causing a stir among the distillers of Scotland

Next time you reach for a whisky, just remember you may be an unwitting combatant in a war brewing across the border. Not since Braveheart have the Scots been so disgruntled with the English, ‘the auld enemy’. Indeed, there may be a veritable Brannockburn in your choice of bottle.

The issue lies in a decision this month to give English whisky - a phrase that to many hardcore fans of the brown stuff will seem a tautology - Geographical Indication status, like the Cumberland sausage or the Melton Mowbray pork pie. It defines what Single Malt English Whisky is and what is isn’t, protects its provenance and reputation. It makes it kinda special.

Why don’t the Scots like this? Ask the English Whisky Guild, which represents a good number of the 70 or so English whisky distilleries that there are now - up from around 40 just three years ago. It’s a protectionist move.

According to EWG’s chair Tagore Ramoutar, the Scots were only given the chance to officially voice their concerns because DEFRA rules state they can if they believe they are economically or reputationally damaged by English whisky attaining GI designation.

“And while it would be wonderful if, in 200 years, English whisky did have some impact [on sales of Scotch], it’s not likely,” he laughs.

“The average Scotch customer is not going to get into English whisky, or anything else, at the expense of Scotch. Whisky connoisseurs may buy into English whisky out of curiosity, because they want to expand their horizons, but they will be adding to their portfolio of drinks, not replacing them”.

Rather, he says, this is more so another tale of David and Goliath, the latter, the huge Scotch industry, seeking to squash what is still a tiny craft business down south. Ramoutar doesn’t pull his punches either. The Scots’ reaction, he says, is “bordering on the hysterical."

"It’s unedifying that they’re placing this pressure on small craft producers,” he says. It’s all particularly bewildering given not all English whisky makers will pursue a product that fits within the GI ruling anyway - and maybe only a minority of them.

The GI tract

But what is the GI ruling for English whisky, and why might the Scots still have a case? In brief, it means that while Scotch has to be mashed, fermented and distilled on site at the same distillery, English whisky only has to the distilled at a single site. That means makers can get their malted barley from any certified external source and, the Scots might worry, more easily produce at volume and so flood the Scottish - or even the world - market. As if.

The Scots themselves are being rather sour-mouthed and silent about it all, with the Scotch Whisky Association saying only that the looser arrangement for English whisky “breaks the crucial connection with single site and place”. It argues English whisky should, rather, be called "English Malt Whisky," to distinguish from any product that might claim to be a "single" malt whisky. The Proclaimers aside, single malt, after all, is Scotland’s pride and joy, stereotype pitching as the definitively best whisky there is, even if blended whiskies are in reality every bit as good. The Scots’ proposal is one the English have so far rejected.

If only the confusion ended there. But DEFRA has further muddied the waters by saying English producers could use the term "single malt" even if they are producing in ways not consistent with their GI specification - by, for example, not using copper stills. As the SWA has noted, a DEFRA spokesperson has told one English whisky maker that while it won’t be able to call its product "English single malt" anymore, it could call it "English whisky" or "single malt whisky", just not "single malt English whisky."

Pedants' corner

Now then, sympathy for the Scots is perhaps diminished by knowing the GI specification given to English whisky is, more or less, the same one already applied to whiskies out of the US, Eire and Australia, among other nations. It’s the one whiskies from France are trying to get. So why the Scots’ focus on English whisky in particular? Maybe there is something especially galling about it happening on the Scots’ doorstep. Ramoutar argues that if the Scots can’t get the English whisky makers in line, then how can they hope to fight the same battle in other markets?

On the other hand, even some English whisky producers aren’t happy with the GI situation, and for completely different reasons. Take Liam Hirt, founder of Bristol’s Circumstance Distillery. Why, he asks, is there any insistence that Single Malt English Whisky be made using copper stills at all? Why try to fit it into the Scotch model when the whole point is that English whisky is different, with its own history, traditions and methods?

“The strange thing is that there are objections to all this on two fronts. The Scots' are to do with producing whisky from the same premises [throughout the process]. I don’t agree with that and I don’t imagine [the Scotch Whisky Association] agrees with me,” says Hirt. “[The second front is how] the English Whisky Guild submitted a proposal for GI designation a long time ago, which is when when we left it, because we didn’t agree with its prescription, which was basically that English whisky had to be made the Scottish way”.

He jokes that it’s like trying to make the English wear kilts. “But I’m staying in trousers”.

“We’ve had a massive whisky distillery for over a century and didn’t use copper stills. Ands there are lots of distillers in England that don’t,” Hirt adds. "From my point of view either you have a modern English whisky, doing things in its own way - using modern stills and methods - or you have a traditional whisky that’s made the same way as it’s done in Scotland. But you can’t have both”.

But wait. There’s even more confusion. According to Hirt, DEFRA has since also outlined what it considers the good and bad compounds that can be present in the final English whisky product. Among those compounds are sulphides. The removal of these is usually what reactions with the copper stills achieve, so this suggests that DEFRA is saying that, while other methods are available, copper stills should be used, just like the Scots do. Only the Scots often deliberately make a whisky high in sulphides because, as Hirt puts it, “if you then put the liquid in a cask for 20 years it becomes something truly wonderful. But here’s DEFRA basically saying we’re not allowed to make whisky that way”.

The bewildering battle rages on. There is due to be a tribunal in February to try to iron all this out, because, as Hirt puts it, “if we’re going to go down this GI route then it has to be done properly. As far as I see, [for different reasons] there are English whisky distillers who don’t like it, Irish ones who don’t like it and the Scot don’t like it, so it’s going to be difficult not to change it. I hope it’s not dropped entirely, but all this does make you wonder what the point of GI is.”

A non-hangover-related headache

Indeed, by now you may well not give a tinker’s cuss what English whisky is, whether it’s got a GI designation or not, or what the Scots think about it either. The Scots argue this is the thing: all these definitions, and counter-definitions, the tweaks and blurred lines, only serve to confuse the consumer. And, for the whisky geek, they may have a point.

Yet it’s tempting to point out that, while certain whisky brands carry the allure of being perceived as of the highest quality - the kind of drink that gets name-checked in a Guy Ritchie series - most whisky drinkers just love the aromas, the flavours and the fact too many fingers make them fall out of their armchairs — but they don’t care a great deal for the small print. Not for nothing is the world’s biggest whisky producer by volume - depending on your definitions - now found in India.

“I think that’s right. I’m in the industry though I’m not as geeky as most. And I think the majority of drinkers are probably more like me,” says Hirt. “For me it’s all about the flavour in the glass, and not spending too much time thinking about it”.

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