Bournville Again?

The Tories are suggesting giving local councils more power over the sale and public consumption of alcohol. Personally, in this and in several other areas of policy, I wish that they would use the powers that they already have. For example, when it comes to lap-dancing clubs, why don't they just say no?

In this country, there was once what the Dutch call a pillar defined by, in the words of Ian Jack, "industrialism, imperialism and Protestantism", meaning Protestantism of the old English and Welsh Nonconformist, Scottish and Ulster Presbyterian variety. Where it predominated, the local council (or the Cadburys, at Bournville) very often did either severely restrict or simply prohibit, among other things, the sale and the public consumption of alcohol. Some people didn't like this. But they got by.

Today, there is now what the Dutch call a pillar defined by Islam. Its strongholds are largely where some of the old Protestant ones were, and its political vehicle is very largely the one that the old Protestants did most to create. What if those strongholds were to use either new or existing powers severely to restrict, or simply to prohibit, among other things, the sale and the public consumption of alcohol?