[To the Editor of the SrEcrAToa.] Sui,—May I trespass once
more' upon your correspondence pages, to reply to the note you published under my 'late letter ? In this you pointed out how the number of alcoholics has declined in Sweden, where a special licensing legislative system—the " Bratt " system—is in force ; and you sug- gested that if a similar system were introduced in England, the same decline would operate here.
In the Spectator for December 17th, 1927, it was stated that arrests for drunkenness in Sweden had declined from 58,909 in 1913 to about 29,900 in 1926. In the same period arrests for drunkenness in England had declined from 188,877 to 67,126—a larger proportion than in Sweden, and without the " Bratt " system.--I am, Sir, &c., B. B. WILI.IAMS. 69A Palace Road, S.W. 2.
[We think the writer of this letter scores a point when he shows that arrests for drunkenness have declined to an even greater extent in Great Britain. Nevertheless, he stated in his previous letter that " whether the drink trade is in private hands or in the hands of the State," neither alcoholics nor " those who drink as much as is good for theoa ," would "reduce or increase their consumption. We maintain that, if we had a system of drink control in Great Britain analogous to that in force in Sweden, the habitual drunkard would find it much more difficult to drink to excess, because he would then only be able to obtain alcohol in restaurants with meals or to drink the prescribed amount of liquor in his own home, and if he was known to be an habitual drunkard he would be unable to obtain any spirituous liquor at all. The same arguments would apply to the second category. —En. Spectator.]
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