THE MAORIS AND DRINK.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 1903, 8 June 1892, Page 6

THE MAORIS AND DRINK.

Sir William Fox, on behalf of the New Zealand Alliance, has addressed to the Premier the following letter, which explains itself :—

Sir,— l have the honor, on behalf of the New Zealand Alliance for the Suppression of the Liquor T.aflic, to call your attention to the issue of a proclamation in the ' Gazette ' of the 14th April labt, by which a previous proclamation, itdue J in 1884, declaring that no licenses for the (■ale of intoxicating liquors should be granted within the large district known as the King Country (and specially defined in a schedule t lereto annexed), Is repealed, and a new district, within the limits of the first mentioned district, containing a single acre of land, is declared a licensing district. This is stated in the proclamation of 14th April to have been dono " w th the consent and at the request of the owners of the lands described," etc. The Alliance are informed that no such consent has been expressed, nor request preferred, by the collective owners of block in which the issue of licenses was jnohibited in 1884, and I am instructed by the Council of the Alliance respectfully to request you to inform them who are the Natives who requested the revocation of the proclamation of 1884, and the creation of the one-acre licensing district, referred to fn the proclamation of April last, and when, where, and how their consent was obtained. The facts of the case haya been very lucidly stated in a leading article ia the ' New Zealand Herald ' of the 24th, of which I have the honor to enclose a copy. I will only add that the creation of the oneacre licensing district, and the granting of a license to a public-house within the original limitP, would practically mean the abolition of Prohibition 'over all the rest of the original district, as it. would become the centre of distribution over the whole of it. The Auckland ' Herald,' in an editorial on the subject, says that the acre exemption ia at Otorohanga, and that the owners are Messrs John Ormsby and John Hettit, halfcastes of considerable influence. It is believed that it is intended to make a licensing district of this one acre, and to issue a license for a house standing on the ground. The whole thing appears to have been done by the owners of the acre. We believe that if the opinion of the whole of the native owners of the King Country were taken it would still be in favor of keeping out any licensed house. If the Government have power to proclaim any acre in any part of the King Country a licensing district, and to license a house on it, then the formor proclamation and the clause in the Act may be swept away altogether. The whole country had better, to save jobbery and corruption, come under the ordinary provisions of the Licensing Act,