A NEW LICENSING ACT.

Manawatu Standard, Volume IV, Issue 165, 10 June 1884, Page 2

A NEW LICENSING ACT.

Tub Licensing Act Amendment Bill, which was introduced last .«e«sion and passed m the Legislative Council, but sacrificed iv the slaughter of the innocents m the House of Repre sentatives, is to be brought forward again by Mr Steward, the member for Waimale. The Bill does not altempt (say ß the Post) any very am : bitions_ reforms, but will, if passed, make one or two material alterations m the Licensing Act. The principal change contemplated is making the election* of Licensing; Commit te s triennial instead of annual. The mover estimates that the present licensing elections cost £10,000 a year, and as v is proposed to make the triennial elections concurrent with the. Local Option polls, and the same arrangements would do for both, he believes that fully £25,000, if not more, will be saved to the country m every three years if this amendment is carried. Another clause removes the present inability of auctioneers to hold wholesale licenses. The only other portion ot the Cill which we need now refer to is that which effects prohibition orders. In the present state of the law, the well-to-do drunkard, against whom a prohibition lias been issued, can easily order his jyrog wholesale outside the district m which the injunction is m force, and may get gloriously drunk as ofteu as he likes, so long as he evades the Vagrant Act. Mr Steward's Bill proposes that if any person against whom a prohibition order shall have been made shall be found m an intoxicated condition, such person shall be liable, on conviction, to imprisonment for any term not exceeding a month j and m case of second or any subsequent offence, for any term not being less than one month nor exceeding three month's ; and if any such prohibited person shall be shown to have, whilst m astate of intoxication, created a disturbance m his or her own house, or to have abused or illtreated any member of her or his family, such person shall be liable, on conviction to imprisonment with hard labour for any term not exceeding six months. The last clause will probably provoke opposition on the hcore of its infriuging the liberty of the subject; but we are inclined to think that it would prove a very wholesome preventive measure.