THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC.

Taranaki Daily News, 1 August 1918, Page 7

THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC.

COMPENSATION OPPOSED. (From Our Own Correspondent.) Wellington, July 29. Robert Stout, speaking at the Unitarian Church last night, condemned the proposal to pay compensation lor the extinction of the liquor traffic, as proposed by the Efficiency Board. He said in effect that there was no legal or moral obligation to pay compensation, that the State was entitled to close trie bars and the breweries in the-public interest without paying anything, and that if the State had money to spend there were many important "and beneficial uses to which it could .be -applied. New Zealand's Chief Justice has always been a man of emphatic opinions and his opposition to the liquor traffic is well known. He obviously was speaking as a partisan, and the officers of the Prohibition Party are not disposed to argue at this stage the point he raises. They have made their position clear already. They do not admit that the Trade is entitled to compensation morally or legally. But they are willing to advise the people to pay compensation if by that means the early, extinction of the liquor traffic can be secured. They are willing, inshort, to waive the principle on grounds of expediency..