Cheers, mate!
I don't know how much of this has been reported in your news so I'll briefly explain why this is happening. The UK is often compared to Western Europe due to geographics. But our cultures, and especially drinking cultures, are completely different. The French, the Italians, the Spanish, for example, are known for their relaxed drinking style. It's known as social drinking. Meeting with freinds in bars and cafe's to socialise and enjoy a glass of wine or a beer is by product of that or they'll have a drink with their dinner. Which, culturally, they'll eat later than us.
Us, on the other hand, we're binge drinkers. The shame of Europe for our exploits. We go out and get plastered, often from a young age, hanging around streets and parks with a bottle of cider. And so a whole culture of crime has developed. Things are out of hand. When it's kicking out time for pubs and clubs, hordes of people congregate on the streets and generally there's anti social behaviour.
The new laws are designed to culturally change us. Change our drinking patterns. My local pub is only going to open for an extra hour on weekends. So instead of me rolling home at 11 I'm just going to crawl home at 12 instead. I'm against the whole thing. We're not going to change how we drink. Not immediately anyway. This could take decades.