DEPUTATIONS.

White Ribbon, Volume 20, Issue 229, 18 July 1914, Page 9

DEPUTATIONS.

The Premier has been waited upon in the last fortnight by three deputations in re gard to the Liquor traffic. An account of the deputation, by the N.Z. Alliance, is published fully in another column. Next, the Trade waited upon Mi Massey, and presented four demands. • 1. That the public should know what new taxation w ill be imposed, or what economies in the Public

Service would he necessary, to make gpod the one million sterling of revenue that the Prohibition party proposes to destroy. It is most amusing to hear these brewers so concerned about the re venue. If brewers and owners of brewery shares were losing as much by the trade as they are making, the State revenue would not trouble them ; they'd get out of the business with all possible speed, and the Government could “fish, for its revenue.” We owned a section of land once, which we let for grazing purposes for is per week. It cost us 2s Gd per week for rates, taxes, and repairs to fences, etc. We never reckoned that land a source of revenue, though we got 13s per quarter for it. So the State expends far more on mental hospitals, gaols, etc. (90 per cent, of which cost is for the derelicts made soby the liqucr trade) than it ever gets from the Trade. Every State that has tried Prohibition has benefited inrevenue, and it is only a fool that refuses to learn from the example of other places. The late Mr Gladstone (who knew a little about finance) said: “Give me a sober people, and I’ll take (are of the revenue.”

2. That no majority short of the existing three-fifths should be untertained, as any less majority would not command the moral respect and support of the people. How funny! The Liquor Trade, since December, 1911, has existed on a minority vote in this Dominion. Moreover, since the same time it exists in 67 electorates on minorityvotes, leaving nine electorates in which the Liquor trade had a majorityvote. Does the Trade think that' their minority votes command the moral respect and support of the people, while the No-License majorities do not, when they three-fifths. 3. That four years is inadequate to allow of the necessary adjustment being made in the Trade’s and in the Dominion’s finances, and we submit that this period should be

extended to at least seven years. Wc quite believe this statement about the Trade’s finances; we utterly deny it in regard to the Dominion’s finance. So long as the Trade exists it goes on manufacturing criminals, moral and physical wrecks, for the State to care for; and it will be the’ first year when revenue is lost and expenditure not much lessened (as wc

still have the wrecks left by the Trade to be a charge upon our rates) that the pinch will be felt, and every year will be an improvement. And if the Trade continues four years or seven years there will be the same pinch to be met as if it continued only one year. That some provision should be made for aiding those who would be thrown out of employment by the action of the Prohibition party. Is the money spent on liquor to be buried in the earth whtfn Prohibition is carried? Or is it to be spent with grocer, draper, coalman, etc. ? If the latter, then we ask our readers to study Mr Bedford’s speech on economics in another column. They w ill see that you c an not invest moneyin any trade that employs less men in proportion to money spent than the Brewery Trade. The third deputation was from the Moderates. The Brewers’ cry to the Premier was, “Save our dollars for us.” The Prohibition cry was, “Save the boys and save the nation.” The Moderates asked, “Keep the traffic going, that we may get the liquor which we love, and arc unwilling to deny ourselves of for the sake of others, who are being degraded, iand our nation which is being slowlykilled by alcohol.”