INVERCARGILL UNDER NO-LICENSE.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLII, Issue 242, 12 October 1908, Page 2

INVERCARGILL UNDER NO-LICENSE.

(By a Blenheim Business Man.) A great many people are carefully watching the effects of No-license in Invercargill. Having recently beenon the spot and therefore in a position -bo form an opinion based on my own observations and the information that | one is able to collect in a casual way, I feel .prompted to give the resulos ot my investigation of the effect of what a great many people regard as anjillimportant matter, viz., the operation j of No-license in the southern city. In ! the first place I was much surprised to find that every town at which the. express train stopped south pi .Uunedin was under No-license, which shows that the reform movement is on a much larger scale than most people imagine. I arrived in Invercargill on the first express on a recent Inursday at 2 p.m., and put up at an erstwhile licensed house, the prosent proprietor of which has let the old barroom to a jeweller, who is carrying on his business there. I then betook myself up town to take observations and gather information. I found Invercargill to be a well laid-out town, -with splendid wide streets, good buildings, and an air of business activity that spoke well for the prosperity of the place. I was informed that of all the hotels which held licenses before No-license came into force (there were sixteen o fthem) only six considered it worthy while keeping a bar of any •!escription—temperance or otherwise— the remainder of the bars being us-ri sls. shops or offices, or else used _ for accommodation in connection with IVO establishment. Having to call on some friends I had to give, up the study; or No-license for the remainder of that, day. • Next morning, and each morning and evening up till the following Monday afternoon, when I left on my return journey, having stopped in the place five days, I set myself to inquire into all "the matters talked aoout in the newspapers connected with the No-license movement. First or all, I inquired about the locker system, which the opponents of No-hcense affirm is the medium through which almost as much liquor is sold ana consumed as was sold over the open bar. I found that only three hotels deal with lockers at all, and I was informed on most reliable authority that m the Southland Club Hotel, which is the centre of activity in this brancn of the trade, there are not more than about forty lockers, and in the other two a smaller number, which seemed to me a very solid contradiction of the statements made as to the great extent to which this system is used. "When one has the system explained, by those who come in contact with it, and realise how cumbersome it is, .and the amount of trouble entailed in getting a supply of liquor, it makes the statements we read in the press oi different places so fair away from the scene of action ridiculous, arid almost impossible, to say the least of it. Having seen, as it seems to me any reasonable minded man must see, that the mueh-talked-of "locker system" is almost a farce, I turned my attention to the sly grog-sellers, and although I inquired from several who are eminently in a position to judge, T was most agreeably surprised to find that each of my informants assured mo that the amount of sly-grog, selling taking place in Invercargill is infinitesimal, when you take into consideration the population of the town. I next inquired about the amount of drunkenness dealt with by the Police -Court, and was referred to a table taken from the Court records, which shows that whereas there were s 2oy convictions for drunkenness during the last eighten months of License, there were only 149 during the first eighteen months of- No-license, (certainly a substantial decrease) but the significance lies here, that of the 149 convictions recorded, the police investigation disclosed the fact, that only four cases had arisen through drink procured in Invercargill. Another fact I learned was that there are no breweries in the Invercargill ■electorate, all having been moved over the town boundary. This, of course, makes the procuration of liquor much more difficult. On the Saturday afternoon and evening, when some people inform us there, is an abnormal amount of drinking and drunkenness, I expected to see at least a few men the worse for drink, but, although I was in and about, town from about 7.30 p.m. until 11.45 p.m. I could not find a single person on the streets the worse for drink, (a fact which in itjself speaks volumes for the sobriety of the town.) Perhaps the most-talked-of evil in connection with Invercargill and No-lioense is the "kegging" evil, and it is reported to be greatly in evidence on Sundays. Favoured with a beautifully fine. morning, according to appointment, I met a friend at 10 a.m., and strolled round the outskirts of the town. Starting from the hospital, we walked out to the town boundary, where there are three or four breweries within a hundred yards of the creek that divides the electorates. "We then turned at right angles through a large residential locality, and afterwards turned again to the right, and skirling the park, passed through a reserve, where the Town Council ,has its nursery. Although we walked through these quiet localities for three hours and kept a sharp look-out we saw no sign of a party, a drunken man, or oven saw an omp-Jiy keg, which I had heen informed on the way down, were to be picked up almost anywhere in the Borough reserves. A specially pleasing afct is that one sees no man about the streets in a low degraded state suffering from the effects of a "spree." The hotel "loafer" and the brewery "cheap beer soakers" are, so far as my experience of the place goes, extinct, and while I was in Invercargill quite the ordinary state of things existed. I might also mention a very significant fact, which is, that prior to No-license being carried, a certain train that leaves Invercargill «very Saturday evening, had to carry a police constable, (in addition to two guards,) because of the. amount of drunkenness and fighting on _ the part of male passengers making it so bad that ladies could not travel without "being shocked and insulted. _ Now, since these men cannot get drink indiscriminately in the town, one guard -can take the train with safety, and ladies can get to town and home again j on Saturday evenings' without seeing fights and bearing filthy language. Now, Sir, I will close with this little summary of what appeared to me to bo the benefits of No-licence to Invercargill. The town is clean morally, I heard practically no bad language on the streets; there are no gangs of young fellows standing at the street corners expectorating on the footpaths, etc. From a business ooint of "view the town is quite as good as any other town that I visited in the course of my tour. In the foregoing remarks I nsve -endeavoured to be concise and 14° i. * coult* say a good deal more, v. aye condensed my remarks as Tnueh as possible, hayino: rl.ue regard to me exigencies of editorial soace.