Liquor Purchase Held Not Part Of Meal

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30366, 15 February 1964, Page 20

Liquor Purchase Held Not Part Of Meal

He did not consider that the payment of Is far a bowl of soup to be consumed at some unspecified time was part of the commencement of a meal, said Mr K. H. J. Headifen, S.M., in reserved judgments given in the Magistrate’s Court yesterday. The Magistrate said he had had to determine whether liquor purchased by five persons at the Madeira Hotel, Akaroa, on Sunday, October 5, during an advertised wine and dine was procured and supplied as part of a meat He held that the payment for the soup as part of, or the commencement of, a meal could lead to a complete abuse of the provisions of the Sale of Liquor Act. “It could mean that a person could drink ail day simply because he was in possession of a Is ticket entitling him, if he thought fit, to consume a bowl of soup,” the Magistrate said, Desmond Hurtford Hancock, licensee of the Madeira Hotel, was fined £ 5 for allowing the consumption of liquor on the premises otherwise than as part of a meal. Five persons found by police in the hotel were each fined £ 2 for procuring liquor otherwise than as pant of a meal. They were Charles Herbert Johnson and Cecil Johnson, of Akaroa, both represented by Mr A. D. Holland, and Douglas Alleyne; Clarence George Oakley, and Margaret' Rose Church, all of Christchurch. All the defendants had pleaded not guilty to the charges. The case was heard in Akaroa on February 5. In his judgments the Magistrate said that police found 13 persons seated at tables

in the lounge bar. All had liquor in front of them, and some tables had knives and forks. Inquiries showed that each person was required on entry to the lounge bar to pay Is. They were given a ticket entitling them to a plate of soup if they so desired. They could have the soup then and there or any time later. After paying for the soup the patrons were then allowed to buy liquor and consume it at the tables. After outlining the circumstances of the purchases made by the five patrons prosecuted, the Magistrate said the drinking and eating must be reasonably related to each other. If that was not so a person could enter this hotel at any time between 11 a.m. and 7 p.m., as advertised, pay Is for a bowl of soup, and drink for the whole of the remainder of the day. “To suggest that such drinking was part of a meal would be absurd. I accept ■that each party intended to have a meal at some time; but I find that the consumption of the liquor in the circumstnaces was not as part of such meal.”