Star.
London, England, 1818-07-06 00:00:00

PORTER.

REPORT OF A COMMITTEE OF THE 1131.7"5E OF
COMMONS, ON PUBLIC BREWERIEi.

ORDZIED Jr, ZOV/Z or COMMONS ro Ng tiIINITZ at m: 3, 1818.
Coalmines to whom the Petition of several Inhabitants of
London and its vicinity, eampla ning of the high Price and
inferier Quality of lima, was re •rred, to examine the Ir.:Atter
thereof, and report the sizne, with their observations
upon, to tilt Hol•se; and to wilJ;11 the evidence taken by the
Conurittee or. the Police of th • IVlutropolis lo the years 1818
and 1817, and in the present ear, so far as it regards the
Licensire, of Public-houses, ,s referred; have examined the
ula•ttra to tittaz ruf.:rred, an Arced upon the following
REP WI:

Your Cei • •ere have, in !Lauince of the directions of the
House, impecere into the matter of the Petition referred to them:
and have eedeavoured to reduce the observations occurring to
them op the evidence which they have heard, under the distinct
head. of complaint es set forth by the Petitioners.
The first object to which the attention o. your Committee
was drawn, is ilea allegation of the Petiiioae itating the Peti-
tioners to be aggrieved by the high price and inferior gualita 21".
Barr, and which they state is obtruded upon Chem, in cause-
quence of the sale of it being confined to particular is. leen.; and
places, which they cal. privileged, meaning to refer to the vs-
tees of liconsing Puble -houses.
'sour Ormeitittee would feel great difficulty in ascertaining the
exact reinureirating price of any manufactured article, and more
especially of a commodity, the composition of which elides of
substances whose prices are not only perpetually fluctuating, but
also differing in the course of very short periods of tt ne, in the
highest degree; teaks', bulged, snch prices were clearly proved
to be excess:ye, eithiv by comparison with the prices paid for
the cemposent ineredients or with lower prices paid in other
parts of the country; they ;herefore cannot but hesitate in pro-
aouncing a distinct opinion as to the precisely fair and adequate
I price at which Boar either has been sold at or late years within the
metropolis, or at width it can now or ought to be supplied to the
politic. They think it, however, their duty to state gene-
rally, that they hare received r.. 3 direct and pointed evidence,
founded upon such as appeared to them conclusive data, that
the prices at which Deer has been supplied (accordiee to its ge-
neral quality) to the consumer during a considerable period. has
fielded more than a fair profit to the Brewers; and fr 0!.... the
evidence of the best Informed on tide subject, who have ap-
peared before them, they are led to conclude, that the profits
to the :Brewers Serve not been extravagant or unfair.
They cannot, hen ever, but cat! Si,e ottani:lt of t.rx 'Lute the
inereled by the brt-wers in the restrepale In
.r mortgage of Freehold and Leasehold Evatea in
Pubiic.hy.ies, both in the metropolis, and stia more in the
country, or in loans to publicans, in order- to secure their et.s-
[OM; nor can they avoid Lelieving, that su.•:i a made of core-
ductieg these ceerena must, thor.gb not proftable to the tr ;re
in general, creele a necesslty of selling at such a price as :nay
secure a trade interest on money so charted, or ass icdene icy
to the per-chasers against the large sums they may be obliged to
pay for licensed Houses. -
Your Committee also do not mean to express arty opirion of
the fairness of prise of the commodity supplied by Breweries,
which, possessing a trade chiefly with houses which may lie
celled proprietary, and dealing also in a lesser degree with free
houses, compel the proprietory houses to take a dffeeent and in-
ferior li7uor to that tut whichaheMe Fart of the retest trade are by
the same brewery supplied; on the contrary, your Committee
cannot reprobate in too strong terms so disgraceful a practice.
The next and the most material head of complaint presented
by the petitioners, is, the mixture cf dekterious ingredients with
Veer, as now made. Your Committee have limited their in-
vestigation on this subject to the six years preceding the date of
the petition, frora a consideration that such a period 'would well
enable them te enter into a fair exan.ination of its allegations,
and to retake a f rf-pert with regard to any practice '.:rich It
mieht be supposed to be the object of the Petitioners to expose
and correct, or v. 144.4 in any manr.er could, at the present me-
meat, affect the interests of the pub:ic. They have called upon
the various °Mem of Evelse, for their returns of convictions,
their seizures of articles prohibited to be sold to or used by
iireweis; the officers who have made such seizures cr detected
illicit practices ; and from this evidence it does not appear that
any deleterious ingredients have been used by any of the eleven
great breweries, within the above period; and it further appears
by such returns, that no articles contrary to law have b :ea
proved to be used by any one of the eleven great breweries,
within the sane period, exctpt in the instance of Messrs. Taos.
Meet's hoese.wliain 1.1.2 had employed a chemist of the name
of Wheeler (eisamined before your Committee) to prepare a
so:sitien of salt if tartar Near/wean acidity whirls had at that time
taken place in what he termed the young beer; but which he
states to be perfectly innocent in itself, and to possess ro perni-
cious qualities, in anydeFree prejudical to the health of consumers.
For this breach of the law Messrs. Manx and Co. were prose-
, cuted, and on conviction paid a penalty of £lOO, with forfeiture
also of their drays and horses. 'VII% Wilma* further stated,
that that establishment had since passed into other bands. The
absence of all other evidence against the eleven great breweries
on this head, together with the inducements for dbdosure and

detection hell out, by'the very heavy penalties annexed to this I
species of offence; viz. (4500, half of which are giver to the
informer) induced them to believe that this charge, so far as it
was intended to be pointed against the eleven great breweries,
is, with the above single exception, unfounded ; and that their
beer has been, and as now brewed,• is composed of malt and
hops, legal colouring, and finings only.
But your Committee must, in justice to the Petitioners, state,
that they do End, both from the Excise returns and from the
seizing officers, that drugs of a very nauseous, and some of a
very pernicious quality, are still vended by persons as a trade,
and bought by the lesser brewers and by the publicans; by
both of them infused into their vats, and mixed iu their barrels
respectively, and in that state retailed to the Public. That this
practice is not confined to the Metropolis, but extends into the
country; and that travellers from London houses have been
known to possess and offer cards, containiag a hit of articles,
together with instructions adapted to the adulteration of beer.
ft is evident that the use of such articles, by the kit:re brewers
and publicans, as have been exhibited before your Committee,
together with the practice of both, in many instances (as proved
by the Incise returns), of mixing table beer with strong beer,
must have a tendency to bring the general beverage of the eleven
great breweries also into a degree of discredit ; to excite a dis-
trust in the minds of the Public, and strongly to induce then, to
lay their complaints before the Legislature, without being able
to point out distinctly the real authors of their girevancc.

Your Committee have also received the must conclusive and
satisfactory evidence front four of the principal brewers, who,
having expressed themselves most wilting to setuatit to any
course of examination Which. your. Committee might think pro-
per to adopt, did, in the most unequivocal and distinct terms,
deny the use of any deleterious or unlawful ingredients in their
respective breweries, or any knowledge or belief of such prac-
tices in any otber'of the eleven great breweries.
Your Committee cannot suggett any other particular mode of
preventing the use of deleterious or unlawful ingredients, than
the following; viz. the strict execution of the Stith Geo. lit.'
with regard to exacting the fullest penalties and forfeitures on
those who thus endanger the health of the consumer; and the
publication of every conviction (when the articles used shall have
been proved to have, been noxious) within the parish wherein
any person guilty of such an offence shall carry oa his trade ;
:lad, in addition to this, a vigilant exercise of the sound discre.
thus reposed in Magistrate, to be els:seised by them, in refusing
licenses to every victualler who shall have been convicted slimy
such practices.
The lest bead of complaint of the Petitioners, in which ;i in-
deed included others of a collateral nature, is, the allegation of
the existence of a monopoly in various parts of the Kingdom,'
and particularly in the Metropolis, by the eleven great brewis- '
ties, a..d to which either the supposed unfeiruess of price, the
use of unlawful ingredients, the alleged inferior quality of beer,
and a cambinatiou to fix the price, have been ascrib .d. Your
Cenunutee, on this head of the Petition, feel themselves called
upon to revert to the iuvestment of etre large capitals in the
purchase of licensed houses by brewer., and the couscquent
zeutirowd decrease of free houses, both is the Metropolis and
in the country, and in which practice that which the Petitioners
turret more epoly, may be s aid chied) to consist ; and i; is clear,
that theueh the present number of free houses in the bills of
mortality may still be sufficient to check, in some degree, such'
monopoly as may now exist; yet an extension cf the present
practice cannot but ultimately affect the full establithment of it,
when at most the only competitors i 4 the trade will be the pro.,
prietore of these houses. When this state of things shall araive,!
the meetings of breweee to fit and lower prices (and which is,
not disguisCd by them, but declared to be steceseary), will uo
tenger be as tmprejudicial as It is now .stated to be, but may be,]
apd probably will be, used as ow.trn of 41:mantling such an
unfelt price frosto the Public as they may he compelled to submit
to. It is trot, that price and notiusiitity is the subject of their
present detereninatims and meetings, and that a compstitilln is
quality is more effectual than any competition in reasonableness
of pricer bat an absorption of all or a greater proportion or free
houses, may enable the successors of the present trades to use
their power in a manner which the trade now declare not to be
:heir practictsetnd totally adverse to their inclinations and Inten-
tions. Your Committee, however, cannot entertain a doubt,
but that It is an object of anxious consideration to the brewers
to prevent any variation from the prices fixed at their general
meeting;; and the same has been evinced in one instance (a
solitary one, your Committee are bound to el:serve), in which a
pecuniary corosideratinn was offered by an agent of a brewer to a
victualler, to induce him to abandon a practice which be had
adopted, f selling porter at a reduced price.
lour Cbmmittee, owing to the late period of the Session,
were not enabled to examine, at any great length, into the state
of .the breweries in the country, but from the inquiries they did
make, it does appear that the abuse of the licensing system is in
progress there, and producing still more injurious effects than
aae of which evidence has Lizen adduced, as effecting the metro-
polis. In the small town of Chertsey it had become most ob-
noxious to the inhabitants,And, but for the exertions of a Noble
Lard, a Magistrate of the County of Surrey, who gave his eel-
dunce to the Committee, would have retnahted without my cor-
rection whatever. A partial correction was, however, effected
by the establishment of one free house • and the competition of
that free house, together with a coffee-house. slid, in a degree,':
produce a supply of better beer to the community. Itis worthy of
notice, that the full establishment of that free house did not take j
place until some of the principal Nubility and Gentry appeared
on the licensing day, and supported the grant of the license. It
C.:ether appears to your Committee, that, in some districts, not
only brewers beccuue the patchasers of licensed houses, but
maltiters and spirit-merchants also; that the brewers hind their
proprietary houses to the spirit-merchant, woo, in return, per.
forms the same survise for the brewers; that the liquor then be-
comes inferior; private families :apply themselves from their
own breweries; ausalier societies brew from molasses in tea-
kettles ; but the poor, who have none of these resources, must
le content with such liquor as is retailed of the licensed kadses, what-
cter seas, be Me quality. the price, or the measure. This system of
purchasing licensed houses, appears to be condemned by two of
the principal brewers, who meet be supposed best to know its
evil tendency and effects, Out only as against the public, but as
against the protperity of their own trade. Mr. natclay ex-
preosly condemns it, and states that it is now increasing; and
that a brewery supported by purchased public-houses, must de-
tmiorate the quality of their beer. Mr. alartiseas is of the same
opinion. _

Your Committee, oa the difficult question of applying a pro-
per and temporate remedy to this evil, and avoiding, as much as
possible, proposing any trwasure by which th.rt apt ire of pro.
perty which the Legislature has, by its attention not having been
called to the subject, permitted to arrive at its present magni-
tude, beg leave to suggest, that it may be fit to enact son; pro..
spective law, whicii, at a given period of time, shall direct the
Magistrates to refuse licenses to such houses as shall, on due in-
appeer to them. by any new contract, purchase, or mort-
gage, to have become. in substance, the property of a brewer ;
ami until some regulation of this nature shall be adopted, they
beg It ave to ALlnTlit to the 1-13t1E., that they entirely concur in
that part of the Report of the Polk: Committee,which earnestly
calls on " tilt! Magistrates in the country to lend their add to
break down a confederacy, which is so istiariusts to the interests of
tke poor said c:asses of ihr c,,mst unity.
June 3, 1818.

An Oid Man's Atkice to a Young Member of Par-
liament.—Enter the House of Commons as the Temple
of Liberty ; do not dishonour that Temple ; preserve
your freedom as the pledge of your integrity. Read,
inquire, hear, debate, and then determine. Do not
without inquiry approve of, nor N‘ ithout good cause
oppose, the measures of the Court. The true patriot
will lend his assistance to enable the King to admini-
ster justice, to protect the subject, and to aggrandize
the nation. Avoid bitter speeches ; you meet not to
' revile, but to reason. The best men may err, and,
therefore, be not ashamed to be convinced yourself,
nor be ready to reproach others. Remember, that
your Electors did not send you to Parliament to make,
your fortune, but to take care of theirs. When you
do speak, take especial care that it is to the purpose;
and rather study to comine yourself to the subject
with brevity and perpicuity, than to indulge yourself,
with the unnecessary display of a flowery imagina-
tion. If you feel all right within, you will scorn to,
look round the House for support ; for be assured
that GOD, your couscience, and your country, will
support you.