Opposition To Licensing Bill

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30270, 24 October 1963, Page 17

Opposition To Licensing Bill

(New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, Oct. 23. “The voting in Parliament on the Licensing Amendment Bill will be a simple index to who is on the side of the people as opposed to the breweries and vice versa,” said the secretary of the Licensing Reform Association (Mr C. V. Bollinger) in a statement today. "This bill would deny to the people of the remaining dry areas voting for restoration the right to set up their own district trusts to control the licensed amenities of

which they have so long been deprived," said Mr Bollinger. “It would also open up these areas to the brewerydominated pubs which the people of area after area have specifically rejected. Undoubtedly, the breweries had their eyes on the two areas of Auckland suburbs an<i Wellington south, where there was a considerable chance of local restoration being carried on November 30. “Under existing legislation, these areas would almost certainly vote for trust control—as so many other areas have done before. The new field of investment would then be closed to the breweries,” said Mr Bollinger. Since the bill had been introduced late in the session, with a very limited time in which its contents could be publicised, a tremendous responsibility rested with members of Parliament to see that the rights of the public were safeguarded, he said.