COMPENSATING LICENSEES.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13811, 23 January 1909, Page 3

COMPENSATING LICENSEES.

———*". An interesting return is published in Hie Melbourne ■•Argus/' ot tne 1-ith inst., showing the recent results ot the operation of the system ot" reducing tne number of hotels in Yica system of compensating OH-ners of lincenses, which became law in 1907. Keference is 'made to the closing of 217 hotels, between 1880 and l;) 02 under a local option law, at a cost'of 212,770, or an' average. of £9BO each: Evidently the Victorian local option law was combined with compensaion, - but we have no information at hand regarding the law. The new Licenses deduction Board has closed in sixteen months nearly as many hotels as were closed in sixteen years under local option, and at about ■' half the cost, b'rom August 1907 to December, 1908, there were 208 hotels closed, and on 196 of these compensation amounting to £99;177 was- paid, (twelve had still to'be paid); and of that total £57,576 went to owners and £9,005 to licensees. The compensation paid is provided by the trade itself, through a tax of 8 per cent, upon all purchases of liquor. The purchases, returned for tax in 1907 were £1,007,700, and for 1908 at £1,618,007, yeilding for the two years at 3 per cent., £96,775. The aggregate purchases of the 208 hotels closed "was practically £I,OOO a week. Correspondence received by the Board, says the "Argus," showed that great interest was being shown in the working of the system in Great Britain, the other states, and New Zealand. The Board states that its action in dealing with convicted houses first had led to a marked decrease in convictions, and nLso that there was a great improvement in the conduct, cleanliness, and sanitary conditions of metropolitan ir hotels was now snnnorted by similar reports from the licensing inspectors in other districts.