§ SIR HENRY KIMBER (Wandsworth)To ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his attention has been drawn to the statements in the Blue-Book issued by the Home Office, Licensing Statistics, 1907 [Cd. 3951], that while the convictions for drunkenness in England and Wales for the years 1905, 1906, and
§ the United Kingdom in 1907, including the estimated coal equivalent of coke and patent fuel.
§ (Answered by Mr. Lloyd-George.)
§ 1907 show a steady decline in proportion to population, the convictions in the year 1907 being 56.40 per 10,000 persons, yet when England is taken separately from Wales the proportion is 44.21 per 10,000 persons in English divisions as against 119.48 in Welsh non-county boroughs; and whether he can state any reasons for this disproportion, seeing that Sunday closing is adopted in Wales and not in England.
§ (Answered by Mr. Secretary Gladstone) I beg to answer this Question on behalf of my right hon. friend. I am afraid the hon. Member has confused two sets of calculations given in the Blue-book, namely, figures based on the estimated population of 1907 and those based on the Census of 1901, and he has also placed side by side for comparison two different kinds of areas, namely, English petty sessional divisions which are largely rural, and Welsh non-county boroughs, which are urban in character. It is, however, true that convictions for drunkenness in Wales are, generally speaking, at a higher rate than those in England. Thus, according to the population at the last census, the English convictions were 60.33 per 10,000, while 1625 the Welsh were 65.15. Too much stress must not be laid upon the figures of convictions, and there may be many explanations of any differences that are shown to exist between one place and another. But it may be observed that the proportion of on-licences to population is higher in Wales than it is in England. In Wales it is 35.43 per 10,000, and in England 29.69.