The Press. Wednesday, May 8, 1918. "State Purchase " In England.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16206, 8 May 1918, Page 6

The Press. Wednesday, May 8, 1918. "State Purchase " In England.

The question of the State purchase and control of the liquor trade in England has been carried a stage further by the important reports of the English, Welsh, Scottish, and Irish Liquor Trade Finance Committees, summarised in our cable news yesterday. These committees avoid the question of policy and confine themselves to finding out and suggesting what would be equitable terms on which to take over the trade should State purchase be decided "upon. They report that the gross total -will be. over £400,000,000, and substantially less than 1*500,000,000. The committees do not contemplate that the purchase will be carried out until after the war, but suggest that the State could take control of the traae earlier by giving a pledge of ultimate purchase, after i which the State would be free to reorganise and consolidate the trade at will. The English Committee recommends the issue of spccial Government | stock for payment, and that the trade should be bought out on the basis of the profit it was earning before the war. "What tended i more than anything else to spread the idea of State control in England was the success of the Bishop of Chester's scheme of a reformed public-house. In his letter to "The Times" in 1892, the Bishop pointed out that ordinary proposals for tem- ■ perance reform failed, on the constructive side. Their aim was to restrict or even abolish the sale of alcoholic beverages. Tha Bishop took the view that the use of such beverages must be accepted as inevitable, and that the best plan to adopt was not to seek to abolish the drink trade altogether, but to reform it. One of the great evils of the present system is that those who conduct pufclic-houses have a direct pecuniary interest in seeing the largest amount of drink possible. The Bishop,

on the other hand, started companies to buy up all public-houses in a district, and to substitute the reformed public-house where the provision of food and entertainment was made the first care, and the sale of liquor took second place. The managers got no commission on tho liquor, only on the food, and tho companies were satisfied with o per cent, interest. These have undoubtedly done good work in the places where they have been in operation, and it is proposed that the same principle should be adopted under State control.

The war has helped forward the same idea in two ways. It has been found necessary, in the first place, for the State to exercise a large amount of control over tho sale of liquor, and in the second place the pub'lic have been accustomed to the idea of borrowing large sums of money, tho mere contemplation of which, would have staggered them before the war. Nevertheless, it is doubtful whether we shall see State purchase and control an established fact. The brewers and licensed victuallers were not altogether averse from tho idea at first, but aro now showing a growing opposition to it'. In spite of war restrictions —partly perhaps in consequence of war restrictions and regulations—brewery profits are higher now than they have been for many years. Tho extreme prohibitionists oppose State purchase, believing that nothing short of total abolition is any good. Apart from these two sections there is among the general public a growing feeling of distrust of Government interference and control. The creation of an army of Government employees to carry on the trade in intoxicants would certainly be another largo advance in the direction of State Socialism, and v. we know from our experience in New Zealand the effect which Stato employees are capable of exerting in the field of general politics. 31 r Lloyd George is understood to be strongly in favour of State purchase as a solution of the liquor problem, so that it is not im-

probable ihe proposal will bo proceeded with. For the reasons wo have stated, however, we hardly expect to see it carried into effect.