SPREAD OF HOTEL HOURS

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27709, 13 July 1955, Page 12

SPREAD OF HOTEL HOURS

Justices To Discuss Suggestions POSSIBILITY OF 9 P.M. CLOSING (New Zealand Press Association) GISBORNE, July 12. Urging consideration of revised licensing hours, Mr E. S. Hilton, president of the New Zealand Justices of the Peace Association, told members of the association’s Gisborne branch todgy that a remit advocating changed hours would be presented at the annual conference, to be held later in the year. The matter had been brought up at a conference of Magistrates, Mr Hilton said.. The new hours suggested were from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., and from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Mr Hilton considered such a change would do away with the unseemly conditions which, he said, prevailed in the “five to six scramble.”

Three main improvements which. Mr Hilton said, would result from the new hours, were: (1) home life would be improved if men went straight home after work; (2) the changed hours might help to minimise juvenile delinquency; and (3) they would probably reduce the number of cases of driving while under the influence of liauor. Records showed that it was mainly after 6 p.m. that offences such as drunken driving occurred, said Mr Hilton.