CONTROL OF LIQUOR

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 6, Issue 4, 14 September 1942, Page 5

CONTROL OF LIQUOR

AWAKE N.Z. CONTENTION

NECESSARY WAR EXPEDIENT

A letter from Headquarters to the local branch of the Awake New Zealand Campaign relative to the stricter control of the

liquor traffic as a war expedient was considered at a meeting

last Friday evening, over which Mr L. Buddie presided.

I The communication staled that the promise, three weeks ago of the Acting Prime Minister, Mr 1). <1. Sullivan, that the Government Nvn? urgently considering the matter of rationalising the. liquor traffic, to save tyres and benzine as well as zoing to save other transport and manpower, had apparently been 'shelved.;? It was claimed further that there had been nothing but a blanket of silenec from the Government since the Avar started regarding abuses of all descriptions in the liquor traffic and. people should not hesitate to discuss ways an;l means of forcing the traffic bade to normality in war time. Another requisition to the Prime Minister had been to the effect that the anti-shouting laws, introduced in 191-fi, when the last Avar was at its height, should lie again imposed. Unless the Government was prepared to deal instantly and drastically with the liquor cancer in New Zealand's defence, it would lead to the greatest boil-over of public opinion that has been witnessed in this war. The Dominion Provisional Committee sought the urgent comments of all branches, on a proposal to throw down the gauntlet to the War Cabinet with regard to these, abuses, set thein a dead line date by which to make a public statement, failing which it would call simultaneous mass meetings on the same date and hour in every town in which a branch existed. The committee afccr discussing the matter at seme length decided that as the original a : m of the Awake New Zealand Campaign was mainly to direct public attention to matters of defence, parti eularlj' with! reference to the Home Guard, and also that as the liquor question had become more or less of a political issue that it did not desire to be associated with the subject, apart from the deliberate wastage entailed by the transport of liquor over areas already served by rail.