SATURDAY, DEC. 19, 1896. THE LIQUOR TRADE.

Hastings Standard, Issue 201, 19 December 1896, Page 2

SATURDAY, DEC. 19, 1896. THE LIQUOR TRADE.

Though the general election has resulted in very considerable defeat of the ultra-prohibition party, and though the result of the licensing poll shows that the public are not prepared even to reduce the number of licensed houses, it is well to remind those interested in the liquor trade that this must not be taken as an indication that the public approve of a lax administration of the present law. On the contrary, we (Press) believe the new Parliament will be even more disposed to insist on rigid compliance with the law than was the last Parliament, in which there was so large a proportion of extreme prohibitionists. The brewers and publicans, therefore, if they have a true regard to their own interests, will do their utmost to endeavor to secure rigid compliance with the provisions of the Licensing Acts. The prohibition movement is not killed. It is only scotched. The public are very sick of the extravagances of the extreme prohibitionists. But the public do not love the law-breaking publican, whose only aim is to sell as much liquor as he can. It now remains for the publicans to prove by their conduct during the next three years that law breakers of the kind just mentioned are few and far between in the trade. If the hotels are properly conducted, if hours are strictly adhered to and Sunday trading abolished, and if great care is observed in not supplying liquor to those who have had too much ; in other words, if the law is generally well observed during the next three years the prohibitionists will not make much headway. But if, on the other hand, members of the trade do not behave in a law-abiding manner, they may depend upon it that the pendulum will swing the other way, and there will be a reaction in favour of extreme views. It is not too much, then, to say that the future of this question lies in the hands of those who are most directly interested in it. They have got their chance now. If

they think they are now free to indulge in a prolonged bout of lawlessness and that they may treat the Prohibitionists as a vanquished party they will find when the next licensing poll is taken that a vast number of moderateminded people will join forces with the extremists and largely reduce the number of licensed houses, if, indeed, they do not close them altogether.