LESS BEER.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20951, 14 February 1930, Page 18

LESS BEER.

SYDNEY MORE SOBER. REMARKABLE DROP. (From Otjb Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, February 6. Sydney is either becoming more sober or the economic conditions are such that the people have not the same amount to spend in alcoholic liquors. Everything points to an increase in sobriety, either forced or voluntary. With a remarkable decrease in the consumption of beer there has been a decrease in the consumption of spirits. December, for many reasons, is considered a good beer drinking mouth.. Hotelkeepers usually consider that period one of their best. Yet the sales during December last were exactly 294,575 gallons less than during the corresponding month in 1925. There are many reasons for this. The weather, for instance, was not so hot. Heat engenders thirst. But the basic reasons are the depression caused by the mining trouble and the drop in values of Australia’s exported products, Mr Crawford Vaughan, one time Premier of South Australia and now moving figure in the New South Wales Alliance, discounts any idea that the decrease in beer drinking is due to the progress of the temperance movement. “It is the hard times,” he says. “ The decrease has been too quickly apparent to be due to any sensible propaganda. Had the decrease extended over a num her of years we would have attributed it to the growth of education among the masses. And it musk not be forgotten that an increase in the price of beer means decreased consumption.” Speaking on behalf of the Licensed Victuallers’ Association, the secretary (Mr J. D. Dunlop) voiced the same view. “ The purchasing power of the people has diminished largely,” he said “ The decline in the consumption of beer is not due to the dislike of the public for that beverage, nor to a growing wave of intolerance for alcoholic drink. It is principally caused by a drastic- curtailment of expenditure on all but the most necessitous expenses by every section of the community. Beer is essentially the drink of the worker, and its needs no experts in this State’s economies to tell us that there has been more unemployment during the past 1,2 months than for many years. Higher prices have also had their effect on the consumption of liquor.” The secretary of the Federal Viticultural Council. (Mr C. S. Panton) says that the increases in the prices of beer and whisky, even in times of depression, have been good to the sellers of ine. Men who formerly drank spirits, and many who favoured beer, had now turned to wholesome wine. That was apparent among all the wine bars, and particularly in the great increase in trade in, the larger and more exclusive saloons. Growers and wine makers had noticed with great satisfaction that when people adopted wine as a beverage they seldom turned again to the stronger drinks,