GROWTH IN SOBRIETY

Evening Star, Issue 20022, 13 November 1928, Page 15

GROWTH IN SOBRIETY

WHAT BRITISH STATISTICS SHOW A sinking change is taking place in the drinking habits of Britain (says the ' Sunday Express '). In 1900 the consumption ol spirits in England was 32,239,522 gallons. In 1910. it was 22,004,432 gallons. To-day it has fallen to 10.412.921. and is growing less. , I’he figures for Scotland—the home of whisky—are even more significant. The consumption of spirits in Scotland was 8,623,092 gallons in 1900, 63,709,343 in 1913. and 2,456,283 last year. The decline m beer drinking has been equally striking. Consumption, in bulk barrels has been as follows; 1913. 1927. England ... 30,758,800 23,418,640 Scotland ... 2,119.666 1,673.5/6 It is not srprising to learn in view of these figures that the leading brewers are contemplating a joint advertising campaign in order to implant the idea that “ beer is the healthiest drink.” What is the cause of this new wave of sobriety? Students of social conditions point to new inventions, new habits, wholly new paces in the speed of life. The lure of the cinema the lure of the wireless, have emptied the public houses. Still another time-honoured custom has vanished; no longer does the business man step out for his glass of tawny port at 11 o’clock He takes “ morning coffee.” . . Motor care, too, are playing their part. Time was when the sober horse ambled safely home with the tipsy driver. But the motor does not know the road so well. Formerly one could drink before driving; to-day one drives before drinking. A man who has to drive home drinks less, if he drinks anything at all, after he gets home. The latest figures on clearances for bonded spirits, for tho first half of the present year, show a decrease of S per cent compared with the same period of 1927. COMMUNITIES GOING DRY. Whole communities appear to be going dry. The number ot oh-license public bouses in 1914 was 86,000. Last year it was 79,000. It is estimated that before the war there were two million total obstainers in Great Britain. Recently Professor Bowlby and Sir Josiah Stamp, in- their report on the liquor question, estimated tins number to have increased to ten million. And the same estimate was made in the Colwyn report. “Outside the population of total abstainers,” said the secretary of the United Alliance, “we estimate that there are ten million more persons who now spend only £2 per year on intoxicants.” In 1910 there were 2,000 clergymen who were stockholders in breweries. Today there are about 200, and not a few of these are trustees for estates and cannot help themselves. These figures suggest an influence which is reaching not merely multitudes of people, but multitudes of congregations. DECREASING DRINK BILL. “ I estimate the drink bill in Great Britain during 1927 at about £298,800,000, as against £301,300,000 _ m 1926- This is the lowest figure since 1918. The high year was 1920. Then the bill was £469,700,000, a consumption per head of £lO. The consumption per head to-day is about £6 Iss, and the end of the current year will show a further decline. The Time Temperance Association submits figures showing that tho total proceedings for drunkenness in England and Wales in 1927 were /4,303. Five years ago the number was 84,207. A booklet just issued by the Brewers’ Society states that the proportion of on-licenses to population has fallen in tho period 1905-1927 from over twenty-nine to twenty per 10,099. it details the extraordinary efforts being made by publicans throughout England and Wales to make their premises more jnyiting. Public houses to the number of 13,542 in the last five years have been enther rebuilt or redecorated with an average expenditure of £913 per house. . . Whether this campaign will succeed is doubtful. The nation is not likely to take a retrograde step. The wave of sobriety is likely to advance, tor the new generation is learning at school the value of true temperance. It must not be overlooked, however, that although less liquor is drunk it costs much more than in pre-war days, and there_ is plenty of need still for a campaign against drunkenness.