Licensing Law.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 5027, 7 June 1889, Page 4

Licensing Law.

r ihe following is the full text of the remarks made [by Dr Drysdale, chairman of the Port Chalmers Licensing Committee on Tuesday:— It may not be out of place on this occasion to make a few remarks with regard to the views held by the committee and the line of policy we have decided to adopt. Firstly, we are strongly of opinion that the machinery of the Licensing Act was never intended by the Legislature for the suppression or obliteration of what is called the liquor traffic, but rather with a view to its proper regulation and restriction within due limits. We therefore consider that no person who is notoriously pledged to do his utmost to abolish the traffic should be eligible for a seat on the licensing Bench, and that the Licensing Act ought to be forthwith amended in this direction. It is a manifest injustice to which no other trade or industry is subjected that the followers of an occupation which is directly countenanced by the State should nevertheless be compelled annually to fight, as it were, for their bare lives, in order to prevent the occupation of this Bench by men pledged to do their utmost to effect their ruin. And to add to the hardship, these unfortunates are not permitted to stand in their own defence, but are compelled to lay themselves under an obligation to any five citizens whom they can find possessed of sufficient moral courage to waive the obloquy supposed by many otherwise sensible people to attach to such a position. Personally, I will say that had I not an innate love, of fair play, nothing would ever induce me to subject myself to the vilification with which since first I stood as a candidate I have been assailed in certain quarters whence better things might have been expected, to say nothing of a not inconsiderable pecuniary loss. Having said so much on this side question, we wish it to be none the less understood that we shall, to the best of our judgment and ability, guard and protect what we consider to be the interest of the public, and lend our aid, so far as possible, to the cause of order and sobriety. With these objects in view, we hereby urge upon the police to exercise strict supervision over the licensed houses, with the view of detecting and punishing any breach of the Act, such as selling after hours, Sunday trading, and particularly gambling. Finally, with regard to this bone of contention the bottle license, the Committee do not feel called upon to express an opinion favorable or the reverse as to the desirability of the system. Probably, indeed, our individual opinions as members would differ. But, however that may be, we are absolutely unanimous on this point—that so long as the system exists in this immediate neighborhood, and so long as liquor hawking—for it amounts to that—from Dnnedin and elsei where cannot be stopped (and as the late Committee, which was practically a Blue Ribbon Committee, did not put a stop to it, I think we are justified in assuming that it cannot be stopped)—l say, so long as this state of things continues, we are dist inctly of opinion that a policy which would deprive the town of a considerable amount of revenue or which would drive away trade, while it would not help the cause of temperance, nor lessen the consumption of drink by one bottle, would be nothing less than an idiotic and suicidal policy. We have therefore, as you have seen, issued these licenses as formerly.