Scotland's new Minister for Drug and Alcohol Policy, Christina McKelvie, has said that protecting children will lie at the heart of the Scottish Government's revised proposals on the marketing of alcohol.

The newly appointed minister gives her first interview in the role to the Herald as part of our new five-day series exploring Scotland's relationship with alcohol.

The series will examine Scotland's thriving alcohol industry, its value to both the economy and, often rural, communities as an employer and producer of one of our greatest exports.

It will also examine changing attitudes, generational divides, the impact of alcohol abuse and proposals advanced by the Scottish Government and campaigners to tackle it.

Read more in the series, Scotland & Alcohol:

Making such breakthroughs, while protecting Scotland's alcohol industry, has proved to be challenging and, following the stalled Deposit Return Scheme, their is anxious wait to hear proposals for new marketing legislation.

McKelvie told the Herald: "For some of the more detailed areas, we're not quite there yet with that but I think the main thrust of it will be about protecting children."

The minister also talks about progress and "partnership and collaborative working" and plans to introduce a "more connected way" to work, building on that by her predecessors, Angela Constance and Elena Whitham.

"I came in to this area with that good foundation built," she said.

"Where I want to go with it is is obviously to make the the progress that people want to see in changing some of the attitudes in Scotland.

"Alcohol abuse tends to be a symptom of other things - poverty, inequality, domestic violence.

"It's breaking those cycles, it's giving people options and choices to get the support that they need when they need it, and in a form that they need."

Read the full interview here and the follow our series, Scotland & Alcohol, this week in the Herald - with additional content, video and data online at heraldscotland.com and on our social channels.