NEW ZEALAND BECOMING INCREASINGLY SOBER.

Shannon News, 5 December 1922, Page 2

NEW ZEALAND BECOMING INCREASINGLY SOBER.

—STATISTICS PROVE IT

The Otago Daily Times, in a recent issue, makes some very pertinent remarks on the subject of the extent of the intemperate use of intoxicating liquors in this country. “It is rather difficult to understand why it should be considered necessary by some perfervid advocates of Prohibtiion to represent New Zealand as a country in which the vice of drunkenness prevails to a very serious extent and to depict Urn native-born New Zealander as intemperate,” says the Dunedin journal. “The residents of the Dominion who are proud of their country and of .its population have some right to reSent allegations of this character. In point of sobriety New Zealand will compare favourably with most of the other countries of the world. Moreover, it is becoming increasingly sober. The statistics of the convictions for drunkenness establish that conclusively. In the past ten years, while the population of the country has increased by about 200,000, the number of convictions for drunkenness has declined to a marked degree. The proportion of convictions per 1000 of the mean population in 1011 was 11.23. In 1 1920 it Was 7.13. The proportion was lower still last year, when there was a decrease: of 308 (6.94), in the number of prosecutions for drunkenness as compared with the previous year.”

Of course, the agitating “reformers” who are now flooding the country would have you think that we, as a nation, are going to the dogs. They want Prohibition at afTJT cost. But the people of New Zealand have had their eyes opened to these, dodges. They are going to vote Continuance. 83