CLUB LIQUOR.

Patea Mail, 21 June 1881, Page 2

CLUB LIQUOR.

Public attention is called by letter to the existence of a club in Patea, and to the sale of liquor by retail to members of the club. Whether this club exists for the selling of liquor, or whether the club sells tea and coffee as well as intoxicating “ nips,” we are not informed. The only point which concerns the public is that a social club is retailing liquor on unlicensed premises. No application for a license was made to the Licensing Court last week, and it* seems to follow that this club is not complying with the provisions of the Licensing Ordinance which governs the sale of liquor in this district. It is not necessary to suppose this is being done wilfully. It might seem rude, on the other hand, to accuse a whole club of superior persons, said to include two or three magistrates, with being ignorant of the licensing law of the district. The truth may well be that these superior persons have been drinking club liquor under the sweet hallucination that a club is a private dwelling, and in a private dwelling a man may do what he likes with his own. But the law says otherwise. If members of the club doubt this ruling, they can try the point by being brought up before their own club magistrates. In the Sale of Liquors Ordinance passed in 1866, and amended, there is no provision for a club license. The general license requires a fee of £3O a year for selling liquors by retail. Has the club paid its £3O ? If not, why not ? A club which intends to be respectable should not contravene the law. A proper kind of club would say ; “ We are gentlemen born and bred, or at any rate we are gentlemen, and if the State will not permit us to sell liquor to our own members without a license, we will show a proper respect for the law ,by paying for a license—there’s the money!”