Mr A. M. Goulding Sees “No Chance” Of Liquor Reform

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29191, 29 April 1960, Page 10

Mr A. M. Goulding Sees “No Chance” Of Liquor Reform

(New Zeaiand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, April 28. The Parliamentary Select Committee on Liquor Licensing was unlikely to make any major changes in the law, the former chairman of the Licensing Control Commission, Mr A. M. Goulding, said yesterday at the Alligators’ Club luncheon. "I can’t imagine that the committee will know any more about licensing than we have known for the last 25 years,” he said. He said that as long as Parliament was hesitant about licensing laws and felt like taking referenda on “this and that” there was no chance of liquor reform.

“I offered to appear before the select Committee, but they chose to completely ignore me,” he said. Mr Goulding was critical of the select committee system generally. He said the system was getting close to the Star Chamber method of government. Members of both political parties were appointed to a select committee, he said, and the committee then listened to unsworn statements in secret and picked up information as it thought fit. When a committee’s recommendations went before the House the discussion on them was often more like “window dressing” than proper debate. “There should be a non-party vote when select committee recommendations are before the House,” he said. “The House should be fully informed on what was put before the committee by interested parties.”