Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit TUESDAY, AUGUST 8, 1893. A WEAK POINT.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XIV, Issue 3046, 8 August 1893, Page 2

Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit TUESDAY, AUGUST 8, 1893. A WEAK POINT.

Sir Robert Stout's Amending Bill is not by any means perfect, and should it become law a. defect in its working will be quite apparent at the very threshold. The great principle of direct veto which the bill v supposed to embody is only contained in it so far as it puts into the hands of the electors the right or the duty of saying license or no license, or let alone. The cry for direct veto was founded on the unsatisfactory state of the licensing laws which required an elected Committee to say what licenses if any were to be refused. The direct vetoists hold that Committees shrink from the responsibility of selecting the victiws of reduction and consequently 'few if any reductions take place. In Sir Robert Stout's Bill there can be no doubt at all about the Committee* course of action should the public vote gay " no license " —in that case all licenses must be refused.and all public houses must be closed. But should the electors go the half-way distance only which the Bill provides and say " reduce." What follows then ? The number of hotels must be reduced until there are but one hotel for every 750 inhabitants. Then must come in again the Licensing Committee to discharge the invidious task of pruning down to the required number. Take our own district for instance. The licensing district of Ashburton borough is the area within the belts. The census returns for that area give a population of 1600. This would only cover two hotels : and there are six. "Who is the Committee man who would care to accept the duty of pricking off the four houses whose doors must be closed under the provisions of this Bill ? There are not many assuredly, but the pricking off would have to be done, and a delicate duly it would be. It is here, it sceuas to us, that the eld trouble about the Committeea shrink ing from the disagreeable work of the Act 13 likely to renew itself. To an out and out temperance reformer this phase of the Bill would present no difficulty at all. He would very probably put his pencil first upon the house which he thought did most business and say that one must go. Ihen he would probably weed out those within the most easy distances of the business centre, and leave a couple of houses doing outpost duty at the extreme ends of the town. He would act regardless of every consideration but those of temperance, and the possible results would not disturb him. » But to a committee composed of men with no temperance enthusiasm the duly of selecting the houses for doom would be far from pleasant, and stall farther from being an easy one. It seems to us this question of reduction would be better altogether out of the list of issues to go to the electors unless 6ome means can be devised of throwing upon the electors the further duty of selecting the houses to be eliminated. The Bill seems likely to become law, and if it does, it will behove every man with a vote to exercise it, for if the temperance people gain the day in full every house must be closed; if they are only partially successful, the result will be the closing of four; if they fail, things of course will remain as they are. As it is we have six houses paying each £40 to the municipal exchequer—£24o in all, and there are two other houses whose charters are held from other authorities, and the fees therefor do not go into the municipal chest. Six hotels for 1600 irake one house for every 260 or so of population, but then if these houses depended on the people of the town alone for their business there would be no necessity for a local option measure —the question would be settled by the operation of the law of supply and demand, But there is a large area of country above the railway line almost to the foot of the hills and below the line to the sea in which there is no licensed house at all, but a fairly close agricultural population, It is these settlers who mostly use the Ashburton houses, but in the plebiscite to be taken this large area of country will not be repiesented at all, and will not have even the faintest whisper of a voice.