Cromwell on drink
Sir: Richard West (`Drinkers will be persecuted', 31 December) is wrong to say that Oliver Cromwell banned the celebra- tion of Christmas. It was the work of the Long Parliament in 1647. His comments about Cromwell's 'loathsome troopers' are a rehash of the Royalist newspaper pro- paganda of the time. He would do better to look to what Cromwell himself said on the subject of drink. According to Firth, 'he drank wine and small beer himself, and quoted as illogical and absurd "the man who would keep all wine out of the country lest men should be drunk." The idea was contrary to his conception of civil freedom. "It will be found," he said, "an unjust and unwise jealousy to deprive a man of his natural liberty upon a supposition he may abuse it. When he doth abuse it, judge."
These seem simple and wise words, capable of being applied to the modern problem of drinking and driving. There is little point in Mr West enlarging upon the pleasures of drinking in earlier times without taking into account the fact that those pleasures were at a local and domestic level and not conjoined with the use of a highly lethal and wide-ranging piece of sophisticated machinery known as a motor car. A car driver who drinks abuses his natural liberty and must be judged by his fellows. As someone who has to pass sentence on drink/driving offenders, I am only too aware of the harm they can do. Parliament was quite right to create the specific offence of driving while under the influence etc. Where it may have gone wrong is in not widening a judge's discre- tion about whether or not to disqualify for the offence. Obviously some people are more dependent on having their own means of transport than others and may be more heavily penalised by losing their licence. In thos circumstances, it may be right to say `drinkers will be persecuted', but not other- wise.
Sheriff G. J. Evans
20 Gilmour Road, Edinburgh
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