[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sin,--The Oxford Bill is
not so straightforward as the Bishop of Liverpool suggests. It does not give persons the power to decide how the drink trade shall be run in their districts ; it gives that power to people, which is a very different matter. That is, it allows the majority to decide whether the minority shall drink or not, or alternatively whether private or State ownership shall prevail, and the first ease is no different from local prohibition.
State ownership of the drink trade as advocated by the Oxford Bill would mean nationalization. The trade would be owned by the Government and controlled by Government executives, and whether those executives are a Minister or a Board of Management does not affect the point, except that if Parliament had no control over the Board, that would make the State ownership different from ordinary nationalization only in being more despotic.
Under the Bill polls would be taken every fourth year. The Bishop of Liverpool cites this as an advantage, as it would set people thinking. Rather an expensive campaign of teetotal propaganda at the taxpayer's expense.—I am, Sir, &c.,
[Local polls arc not to be paid for by the taxpayers as our correspondent seems to imagine, but out of the Com- pensation Fund. In our view the Drink trade would not be "owned by the Government " or " controlled by Govern- ment executives," as these words are ordinarily understood, but by a public authority like the Electricity Commission or the B.B.C., which cannot be called despotic bodies.— ED. Spectator.]
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