The Question of the Hour.

Southern Cross, Volume 7, Issue 36, 2 December 1899, Page 2

The Question of the Hour.

APPLY THIS TO NEW ZEALAND.

OLD ENOLAND WITHOUT DRINK.

• Amongst the answers to the recent -question of the ‘ Sunday Companion ’ as to what would England be like •without the drink traffic, was one from Sir Wilfred Lawson, with a laconic ‘ Sober.’ Another was from Mr R. W. Perks, M.P., whose answer was also terse, ‘No wmk-houses, no poor rates, no starving children, fewer prisons—an invincible nation.’ Sir J. H. Haslett, M.P., believes that England, Ireland, and Scotland without the drink traffic would be richer, healthier, and happier, and would -exercise greater influence in the world than she does, and that the only blot on our colonising power is that we allow drink to travel with us. Mr John Wilson, M.P., said he found some difficulty in answering a question involving so much. ‘ With rare exceptions,’ he thought, ‘we should have plenty where poverty is. Health would substitute sickness, and miserable hovels would be supplanted by happy homes. The rags of the pauper would give place to the well-clad citizen. The publichouse loafer would become an industrious citizen ; and children who are now a curse would be the hope and help of our industrial life.’ Finally, Mr J. H. Yoxall, M.P., in answer to the interesting but rather academic question, glowingly proclaimed that * The birth-rate would be higher, the babies healthier, the schools better filled with stronger, bigger, brainier children. Home-life would be happier ; hospital, asylum, and prison populations would be decimated; doctors would lose patients and lawyers clients. Slums would •clear away themselves; more and better houses, furniture, clothing, and food would be obtained by more people; the demand for labour and capital would greatly grow, and persons engaged in the liquor traffic would be absorbed into useful occupations. Home trade would be so good that expansions of foreign markets would be needless; savingsbanks would overflow with thrift; books, music, holiday (ravel and other modern luxuries would be available for all. The death-rate would fall; the lengthened terra of human life would be happier and purer; and what lies beyond it would be less doubtful. —Alliance News.