THE HOTEL LICENSEE.

Otago Witness, Issue 4030, 9 June 1931, Page 7

THE HOTEL LICENSEE.

That the lot of the licensee is not always a happy one is made quite clear (says the Australian Brewing and Wine Journal) by the annual report of the New South Wales Licensing Bench and Licenses Reduction Board. The report deplores the fact that, from lack of funds, many owners and licensees were unable to comply with orders for the rebuilding and improvement of licensed premises. Had such improvements been insisted upon, there can be no doubt that many licensees would have been obliged to go out of business. The Licensing Bench has, therefore, seen fit to allow such improvements to stand over for the time being, presumably until the depression show’s signs of lifting. An even more serious aspect of the licensing trade, from the point of view of the public, is thrown into high relief by the report. This is to point out that an entire change, broadly speaking, has come over hotel management. The effect of the depression, it is claimed, has been to alter the character of hotel proprietorship. Hotels, saj’s the report, are frequently pawns for speculation instead of a comfortable investment ministering to public convenience. Such a state of affairs is unfortunate, and the frequency with which hotels change hands these days lends colour to the statement if any reinforcing were necessary. Time was when licensees remained in possession of their hotels for such long periods that their personality was inseparably associated with their house. Such long terms of occupancy, on the part of the licensees, showed a confidence in their businesses which could not fail to infect their clients. When a man intends to remain in possession of an hotel for a long period of years, he makes it his business, by painstaking attention to the comfort of uis patrons, to build up the goodwill of his house. On the other hand, when a man ste]>s into such a business and hopes to step out of it again in a few months’ time, by dint of malting a slender profit on the deal, it is natural that the service given to the public will not be so complete.

x Very well, sir. I’d like that.**