LICENSING BILL

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXI, 3 December 1927, Page 2

LICENSING BILL

HOUSE AND COUNCIL PROBABILITIES OF DEADLOCK ! (By Telegraph) (From "The Mail's" Parliamentary Reporter). WELLINGTON, This Afternoon. In view of the Legislative Council having amended the Licensing Amendment Bill by removing the clause providing foe a bare majority and substituting a per cent proposal, as well as' restoring provision for six year ■ intervals between the polls, an interesting situation has arisen. When the Bill comes back to the House it is practically certain that Mr E. P. Lee,, who took charge of the measure after the Prime Minister had abandoned it, will move to disagree with the Legislative Council's amendments relating to the majority and interval between the polls and the probabilities are that prohibitionists in the House will strive to ensure that the bare majority principle is expressed in the Bill, for they contend ■ that this is already in the existing law. When the three-issue ballot paper was introduced in 1918, the law enacted that a bare majority of votes cast for prohibition over continuance and State control would ensure its carriage and prohibitionists consequently contend that the Council should not exercise its revisory powers in connection with a matter that is already in existence, but only in so far as new principles are concerned. Conferences between the two Houses are certain to take place and it s regarded as certain that if two or three discussions between the managers appointed to represent each side fail to reach an agreement, a deadlock will arise.