ALCOHOL CONTENT OF BEER

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23715, 13 August 1942, Page 4

ALCOHOL CONTENT OF BEER

NEW REGULATIONS EXPECTED

MINISTER REPORTS LESS DRUNKENNESS

Regulations, it is reported, are about to be brought down giving the Minister of Customs power to order breweries to brew beer to a 1036 specific gravity. The Minister (the Hon. A. H. Nordmeyer) was questioned in Christchurch last evening on reported decisions of the War Cabinet, but he declined to make any comment. The powers designed •to reduce drunkenness in the community by reducing the alcohol content of beer and stout were contained in a Customs Amendment Act, which, also increasing the rate of duty, provided for heavier duties to be paid on beer brewed at a specific gravity beyond 1036. The trade was consulted before the alcohol content was reduced, but it is known that some sections of the trade have preferred to brew at the old specific gravity and pay the extra duty, rather than reduce the alcohol content. "Unquestionably,” was Mr Nordmeyer’s reply when he was asked whether the reduction so far of the alcohol content of beer had been responsible for any improvement in the sobriety qf. the community. He said that police reports indicated a general improvement. It was said that that was due to a lower quantity of beer being consumed; but the improvement, he believed, was due to the reduction in alcohol content. Figures were not available yet on which any announcement could be substantiated that a smaller quantity was being drunk.