The food standards watchdog was accused yesterday of a “heavy handed abuse of power” in banning a new low-alcohol wine in the face of Government policy urging people to drink sensibly.

The Food Standards Agency argues that the drink, with an alcohol content of just eight per cent, is wrongly labelled “wine” in breach of European regulations.

But lawyers for its manufacturers, Sovio Wines, told a High Court judge that the official ban by the Agency of its semi-sparkling Spanish white and rosé had “paralysed” the company’s business.

Stocks worth tens of thousands of pounds, held at a bonded warehouse since the 2007 banning order, had been rendered undrinkable and therefore unmarketable because of the wine’s short storage life.

Sovio, “devastated” by the effect on its £1 million venture, would seek to recover its losses from the FSA if it succeeded in overturning the ban, Fergus Randolph, the company’s counsel, said.

He told Mrs Justice Dobbs that in the words of the company’s chairman Tony Dann: “This wine would interest and was produced in particular for a certain section of the market”.

The judge said: “Women.”

Mr Randolph said: “Yes, my Lady, but it doesn’t have to be exclusively for women.”

The wine, he said, was aimed at greater social responsibility. It was a palatable alternative to modern high-alcohol New World wines.

The trouble was that, at only eight per cent, it did not qualify as “wine” under EU regulations.

Sovio, based in Farnborough, Hampshire, argued that it had a “legitimate expectation”, from what it had been told in the past by the FSA, that the wine would be allowed on to the UK market.

The company also contends that since the product was not officially “wine”, it was a matter for local trading standards and no business of the FSA, which therefore had no power to ban it.

In its defence, the FSA argues that the very fact that the drink was labelled as wine in contravention of EU law gave the agency jurisdiction over its distribution - as it would have over water labelled as wine.

The agency also denies giving any indication that Sovio’s product would remain immune from enforcement under the EU’s wine regime.

At 8% proof, the wine is well below the strength of conventional modern wines, which are up to 15%.

It is produced using a technique called “the spinning cone column” that reduces the level of alcohol and yet ensures the wine retains the aroma, flavour and body of regular wines.

Mr Dann said before the hearing: “It’s crazy that this product, which is pure undiluted premium wine, and combines total integrity of flavour with a much lower alcohol content, is somehow illegal.

“The Government is urging the drinks industry to provide a wider range of lower alcohol products, consumers want to drink them and yet the FSA is seemingly trying to kill a product that everyone wants”.

Mr Dann has looked at producing the wine in California because it would be allowed into the UK under separate trade agreements covering wine imports from the USA.

But he said that even this hit a wall of bureaucracy. The FSA said that as the wine was below 9% alcohol it could not be legally called a wine and must be labelled a “wine-based drink”.

The hearing continues.

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