Prime Minister Kevin Rudd will use this week's Council of Australian Governments meeting to ask state and territory leaders to examine whether warning labels could help cut young people's binge drinking.

Federal Health Minister Nicola Roxon, who chairs the council's health and ageing working group, said Mr Rudd would also ask state and territory leaders to consider nationally consistent legislation on supplying alcohol to minors and Australia-wide rules on the responsible service of alcohol in pubs and clubs.

"While young people must take greater personal responsibility for their behaviour, binge drinking is a community-wide problem that demands a community wide response," she said.

"There has to date been no coherent national approach to tackling binge drinking among young people."

Mr Rudd will push for Food Standards Australia-New Zealand to give advice on whether warning labels on packaged alcohol are needed to curb binge drinking among young people.

These could range from a simple warning to graphic images similar to those on cigarette packets.

Ms Roxon said state and territory laws varied on parents supplying alcohol to their children, with some deeming it acceptable if an adult supervised a young person drinking alcohol.

"In some states restrictions on supplying alcohol to minors only relates to licensed premises, or to public venues. What is lacking is a consistently tough message," she said.

"Evidence is emerging that parents are increasingly supplying alcohol to teenagers and their friends. Studies have found that regular drinking during adolescence contributes to the development of risky drinking habits later in life."

There was also anecdotal evidence of ongoing problems with the responsible service of alcohol in licensed premises.

This was compounded by different laws in each state and territory, including on penalties and what is required of pubs and clubs.

"There is no standardised training for bar staff, and in some areas no training at all is required," Ms Roxon said.

ACT Health Minister Katy Gallagher said warnings on alcohol bottles would be welcome if they helped young people understand the effects of binge drinking on their health, but authorities ought to first make sure the message would get through to young people.

"If they are going to move to tighter regulations around alcohol and alcohol marketing, you would have to test it out on young people to see what is going to work, what is going to shock them and what is going to change their behaviour," she said.

"... I don't think for many young people they actually understand the long-term impacts, but also the short-term impacts of what can happen when you are completely out of control and you are vulnerable."

The COAG meeting will also discuss healthcare funding, with Ms Roxon indicating there could be an interim Commonwealth-State and Territory funding agreement instead of a new five-year deal.

Ms Roxon has set up the Health and Hospital Reform Commission to prepare a "blueprint for tackling future challenges" in the health system, including early advice on performance measures for the states and territories.

The five-year funding agreement expires in June and Ms Roxon said it was "certainly a possibility" that there could be an interim agreement while waiting for the commission's final report due mid next year.

Ms Gallagher said it was looking increasingly unlikely that a new long-term deal would be agreed to in time.

"It is March and the agreement is meant to expire on June 30 and we haven't got down to talking about the nitty gritty of this agreement, so I would say an interim agreement is looking entirely likely," Ms Gallagher said.

"And, from my point of view, I don't really care if it is a short agreement we want an agreement in place and we want more money in it from the Commonwealth."

She expected extra money to be tied to a reform process and accepted that, but said she would not lock the ACT into a deal that short changed the territory as the previous one had through poor indexation.

"I don't think any state or territory would agree to a roll over in the short term, because for us, it has been at least $15million a year we are worse off, so even if we roll it over for another six months, that's another $6 to $8million that we are losing."

She was also concerned about Commonwealth delays in setting out reforms it wanted to see in health.

"Really they have got to have a reform plan in place pretty soon if they are going to want to see significant changes, otherwise a federal takeover in my mind almost seems inevitable, particularly if they are going to delay injecting much needed funds into the public health system," she said.