The National Drink Bill.

Evening Star, Issue 6913, 28 May 1885, Page 3

The National Drink Bill.

The ‘Times,’ commenting on Mr Hoyle’s utterances on this subject, says : The publication of the Excise returns has had its usual effect of bringing out the veteran correspondent, Mr William Hoyle, with his annual letter on the National drink bill. We are sorry to say that the gleam of satisfaction which illuminated Mr Hoyle’s mind a year ago has been very transient. He is cnnously sensitive to the rise or fall of the statistical barometer. As the sums with which he deals decline, he becomes relatively cheerful; but the least rise in in the figures sends himgravitating downwards. Lastyear he had good news for our readers. The sum spent on drink during the twelve months had been three-quarters of a million less than that spent during the previous year. Nor did the decline come as a novelty or as an accident. It repeated the course of things from 1876, the year of most drinking, to 1880, though in the two years following there had been a lamentable rise. From 147 millions in 1876, that tipsy twelvemonth, the total had declined to 122 millions in 1880, after which it rose to 126 millions in 1882. Then came a period of decline ; but now the tide has turned somewhat, and Mr Hoyle is grieved to find that the bill for 1884 exceeds by L 871,981 the bill for 1883. What makes matters worse, he thinks, is that this increase in expenditure brings no good to the national revenue. He looks into the figures, and finds the increase has been entirely in beer, while the consumption of wine and spirits has decreased. Tnat is to say, the articles which pay best have been less consumed, and those which pay worst have been more consumed. Beer, it must be remembered, pays but 2id a gallon in duty, while British spirits are” taxed 10s, and foreign spirits 10s 4d. Fifty gallons of beer, then, must be drunk to pay the Chancellor of the Exchequer as much as six bottles of gin. That is Mr Hoyle’s argument; but, like others that he sometimes employs, it is capable of being answered. For example* none would dcu}' that the decline in the consumption of spirits is a good in itself, while it is not quite so certain that an increase in the consumption of beer, if the beer is fairly honest beer, is an evil in itself. It is very possible to get drunk on beer, which is, of course, the staple of the potations of the newly-enfranchised agricultural laborer and many of his brethren. But it is also possible to drink it and take no harm —not perhaps the fourteen quarts,” which is the daily allowance of theLondonsewerman, butan allowance better suited to brains and stomachs of more average strength. But gin and brandy are beverages for which it is not easy to find a good word —gin, that is, at all times, and brandy as it is sold in town public-houses to cabmen and porters. Mr Hoyle should moderate his grief with the reflection that after all, though beer be brewed more abundantly than it was, a check represented by threequarters of a million sterling has been put upon the consumption of British spirits, while the fall in the consumption of foreign spirits has amounted to LIBO,OOO.