§ 47. Mr. DUNCAN MILLARasked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been directed to the conclusions arrived at by the expert Committee appointed by the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic) to report as to the physiological effect of alcohol on industrial and other workers, namely, that the taking of alcoholic beverages to promote working efficiency is not only useless or even detrimental in immediate effect, but is also likely to be in its ultimate results seriously injurious to health, and that, in the light of their knowledge of how alcohol acts in the body, there can be no question that its habitual use by the worker as a substitute for food or in the belief that it gives 1968 a fillip to energy is physiologically un sound; and whether, having regard to this authoritative expression of opinion, he will suspend the further manufacture and sale of intoxicants?
§ The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of MUNITIONS (Mr. Kellaway)As regards the first part of the question, it does not appear proper to judge the conclusions of the Committee on isolated passages divorced from their context, and on this view the second part of the question does not arise.
§ 48. Mr. MILLARasked the Prime Minister whether the attention of the War Cabinet has been directed to the fact that the suspension of the manufacture and sale of beer would release some 575,000 tons of shipping, equal to the employment of twenty-nine ships, each of 5,000 tons capacity, doing four voyages in the year; and whether, having regard to the shortage of tonnage and of foodstuffs, the Government propose to restrict further the present output of beer or to suspend the manufacture of beer during the War?
§ Mr. BONAR LAWThe answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. As regards the second, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Food Ministry dealt with the subject, fully in Debate on the 14th February, and I can add nothing to what he said.