EFFECTS OF PROHIBITION IN NEW ZEALAND

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2987, 26 January 1917, Page 6

EFFECTS OF PROHIBITION IN NEW ZEALAND

Sir,—l am beginning to doubt .the sincerity of your correspondents on this question. After reading their own letters\thcy may realise as workers in the expensive lint barren field of the Alliance and Prohibition that their labour has been in vain. One does not dispute that while the costly prohibition" propaganda has made twelve areas "dry" there has been no diminution, but a large increase, in the aggregate consumption per head of the population. Another, whose hand is the hand of Esau but whose voice is the'voice of Jacob, says: Yes, the drink bill was £3 Is. Id. in 1894, and it was in 1915 £3 16s. Sid., but it was only 18s. fid. in the "dry" areas, and £4 ss. Id. in the "wet"!" ■ - But the fact stands that all the quarrelling, turmoil, and bitterness of this Christian (?) and costly propaganda called Prohibition has not promoted temperance, and, having failed to promote this one virtue by force of numbers, it is only fit for destruction. But says one correspondent, Prohibition is a success in No-License areas, because the liquor registered as going into these areas only totals 18s. 6d. per head of the > population of these areas. Can any sane person believe that tho liquor registered as entering prohibited areas is all the liquor that goes in? Can any sane person believo that the inhabitants of the "wet" areas have not only, increased their drinking capacity individually (which is a fact) but that they are drinking so much the more to make up for the dry souls in No-License districts? If Prolnbifoonists believe that, they woxild believo that a well-fed man or woman would eat four dinners in one- day to mako up for tho semi-starvation of others. But -one correspondent eays the figures on which this absurdity is based are quite official., On examining hie letter further I find, however, that the figures are not official at all. They were first discovered and compiled m Ohristchurch, then there, was an independent computation-in Wellington, and then some high actuary put the finishinn; touches on them. And all these compilings and computations result in the public being- expected to believe tho preposterous assurance that tho people of "wet" areas are drinking ntore than their share of liquorTo make up for the people in "dry" areas! As in America, so in Now Zealand, Prohibition has promoted class hatreds, but not temperanco; much unchristian feeling, but not temperance. It has neglected temperance for politics and force. It has not reduced the consumption nor the per capita expenditure. With such results apparent to the men and women of this Dominion, and with tho operations of the Liquor Board of Control in Great Britain so successful in reducing drunkenness, is it any wonder tho electors of New Zealand are turning their attention to a system of State control in this country as the next stop in licensing reform ? Leading social reformers throughout the Empire, even in New Zealand, are accepting tho truth about Prohibition, and are abandoning it for praver, moral suasion, temperance, and State control.—l am, etc., O.b.