LICENSING COMMISSION

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 April 1945, Page 2

LICENSING COMMISSION

TOURIST TRAFFIC DANGERS

WELLINGTON, • April 19. “I would not stop tourists coming here, but I would not attract them, ’ said Mr H. Trewby, a clerk in the Railways Department, in supporting before the Royal Commission on Licensing to-day the contention that the licensing lavz should not be altered in certain directions to provide foi’ overseas tourists. Tourist traffic was unnecessary to New Zealand, he said. The country had great resources in its pastoral land with which to earn a living without tourist traffic. Tourist traffic encouraged avarice in that it encouraged trades people to charge for services what the tourist would pay, rather than what the service cost. It encouraged a state of mind which held nothing inviolate. For example, it had been suggested that the grave of Donald Sutherland, a pioneer of Milford Sound, should be cleaned up as an attraction to tourists at Milford Sound, there being no question when the suggestion was made of honouring Sutherland. The traffic encouraged jealousies, one section of the community being inclined to feel that it was not getting its fair share of the trade, a feeling which had given rise to the suggestion that the South Island should have a separate Parliament. He believed that tourist traffic discouraged youths from going on the land by setting an example from the State of a get-rich-quick policy. i The last evil of the traffic was its effect on Maoris. Between Maori and pakeha there had been an unwritten agreement that they co-operate m catering for tourist traffic, but it was the Maoris who had the rough end of the stick, and had to do the singsong and dancing. Mr Justice Alpers had written in “Cheerful Yesterdays that Maoris had been degraded into “cadging showmen.” WORKING' MEN’S CLUB WELLINGTON, April 19. Evidence was given before the Royal Commission on Licensing today by Mr H. J. Shanks, secretarymanager of the Wellington Working Men’s Club, to rebut statements made to the Commission on Monday by Mr H. H. Thompson that breaches of the Licensing Act occurred daily in the club, that it was the worst-run working men’s club in New Zealand, and that it was a disreputable concern. Mr Shanks said he had been secre-tary-manager for 11 years. Mr Thompson became a member m December, 1939, but had been suspended for not returning a library book Since then he had been on the club s premises twice, once to deliver, a letter, and once to demand the right to enter the club. It was not true that it was commomn for 50 to 100 men to be drinking in the club when licensed premises were closed, anu he denied that liquor was sold there after hours. The statement that there was drinking on Sundays was ridiculous. It was impossible for liquor to be sold after hours, as Mr Thompson had said, said the witness, explaining the method of locking the bar and draining the pumps. With a membership of 1400 there were some men who wanted to drink surreptitiously after hours. They niigm procure it before 6 p.m. and hioe it. The executive had done its utmost to prevent that, and during tne last two years 11 members had been suspended for drinking liquor on tne premises after hours, and two had been asked for their resignations. Visits by the police were, quite frequent, and on a recent visit several men had been found drinking after hours liquor purchased before b p.m. They would be the only .prosecutions for that offence in which the club was involved since the emergency regulations were introduced. GOLF CLUBS’ PLEA WELLINGTON, April 20. On behalf of the New Zealand Golt Council, the parent body of Goh Clubs in New Zeland, Mr D. R. Richmond, solicitor, urged before the Royal Commission on Licensing, yesterday, the granting of charters to golf clubs that were able to appij for them. He said it would bring the sale of liquor into the open, under proper control, and remove from chibs the temptation to break the law bv resort to devious means, and devices to supply their members demands for liquor. Golf clubs in other parts of the Empire had charters, and as long as the trait in human nature which made goffers . look forward to drink with their friends aftei the game icmained, it was better that proper provision be made.