licenses and taking seven times the rateable value of their premises as compensation at the beginning of the period. To secure the necessary funds in advance, a loan should be raised on the security of the license rentals. (5) At the end of the period of seven years, the licensing authorities would have power to reduce the number of licenses below the statutory maximum, without any compensation being given, and the field would be clear for any legislation, experimental or otherwise, that Parliament might be disposed to enact. (pp. 265270.) POPULAR CONTROL. Local Veto.-The arguments for and against Local Veto are set out at length. The general conclusion arrived at is that there is no evidence that public opinion in England is at all strong enough to justify such a measure at present. "It would be rash to predict the course of public opinion during the next decade, but since, in any case, Local Veto could not be tried until the seven years to be allowed for reduction had expired, it might be well to postpone any decision as to its adoption or otherwise until that period of transition has expired." In Scotland and Wales, however, the case is different, and the Report suggests that, at the end of the given period, a wide measure of direct popular control might be applied to Scotland and Wales. Local Management.-The Report does not recommend adoption of any system of municipalisation. "Local Management," it is admitted, "has many attractive features. The elimination of private profits could not fail to be of public benefit, both directly and by diminishing the obstacles to temperance reform. The evils of the tied-house system would vanish. The anomaly of large gratuities to private individuals would also be abolished." But there are certain dangers: "The difficulty of enforcing the elimination of private profit will be probably found to be no small one." "There is no reason to doubt that a certain class of brewers will be as ready, under the stress of competition, to bribe the municipal officers as they have notoriously been in the case of canteens." "There is also a real danger-unless the appropriation of the profits is scrupulously guarded--lest some of the pecuniary benefits should percolate into some strata of the local society, and lest, through want of watchfulness or under the pressure of undue influence, the Managing Committee should relax the stringency of their regulations or the vigour of administration, and should so open the door to evils which would strongly resemble those of the old system, and, perhaps, might be found more difficult to eradicate." (pp. 270-279.) |