Liberal nub hours sought

Press, 29 May 1985, Page 24

Liberal nub hours sought

By

MERILYN CHAMBERS

NZPA staff correspondent London A report on Scotland’s

liberal pub-drinking hours may show the way for extending licensing hours in England and Wales despite opposition from temperance groups. Strict licensing laws dating back to the days of the World War I, still exist in Enlgand and Wales, so that alcoholic beverages are served in many pubs south of the border only at lunchtime and in the evening. This totals about seven hours a day, apart from pubs in inner city areas which have an extra hour or two for serving. However a study, just completed, into Scottish licensing laws is likely to bring increasing pressure for change in pub-opening hours in the rest of Britain.

Conducted by the Office of Population, Censuses and Surveys, the study is seen as showing that a majority of

those questioned in Scotland favour the more liberal licensing laws which were introduced there in 1976.

It also suggests that liberalisation in Scotland — once the most restrictive country in the United Kingdom — has not led to any large increase in alcohol consumption.

The “Sunday Times” reported that Ministers in the Home Office, which will consider the Scottish report soon, are broadly in favour of change in England and Wales. But moves to extend drinking hours will be strongly contested by Church and temperance organisations.

Brewers and publicans say that more liberal licensing laws would benefit tourism and help ailing pubs to expand their services and create more jobs.

There has been widespread publicity in recent years that pubs have been unable to keep up trade, with many being forced to close.

This decline in clientele has also seen the change of traditional ale pubs into wine bars which have proved popular in city centres. Britain’s Brewer’s Society, however, has moderated calls, saying it is not looking for a free-for-all but a variation, rather than extension, of hours to spread trade round. In Scotland pubs have taken advantage of regular extensions available at the discretion of licensing boards so that many pubs are open from Ham to midnight. The resourceful drinker prepared to move around Glasgow and Edinburgh can buy a drink from

six in the morning to four the next morning, seven days a week.

In England and Wales the licensing trade, backed by the boards for English and ; Welsh tourism and consumer interests are cam- •' paigning under the banner r of Flag — Flexible Law Action Group — for pubs to ' be able to open for 12 hours between 10am and midnight. :

Opposing this, the pres- ' sure group Action on Alcohol Abuse says 12-hour * opening could lead to dan- ’ gerous increases in alcohol consumption and would con- ’ vey the impression that it •• was socially acceptable to ' drink at any time.

It says the evidence from Scotland does not justify claims that drunkenness and other drink-related problems had declined.