State Management Scheme

The State Management Scheme brewery, 1916–1971

The State Management Scheme was the nationalisation of the brewing, distribution and sale of liquor in three districts of the United Kingdom from 1916 until 1973.

History

The main focus of the scheme, now commonly known as the Carlisle Experiment, was Carlisle and the surrounding district close to the armament factories at Gretna, founded in 1916 to supply explosives and shells to the British Army in the First World War.

There were three schemes in total: Carlisle and Gretna, Cromarty Firth, and Enfield. In 1921, Carlisle and Gretna was split into two separate areas. Carlisle was the larger part and supplied some beer to Gretna. In 1922 the Enfield scheme ended and its public houses were sold back to private enterprise.

The scheme was privatised by Edward Heath's Conservative Government after the passage of the Licensing (Abolition of State Management) Act 1971. Between 1973 and 1974, the assets of the scheme were sold off.

Ethos

A central pillar of the scheme was the ethos of disinterested management: public house managers did not accept tips and had salaries, so they had no incentive to sell liquor, which supported the aim of reducing drunkenness and its effects on the arms industry. From 1916 to 1919 the scheme had a "no treating" policy, forbidding the buying of rounds of drinks.

The Redfern Inn at Etterby, Carlisle

Architecture

The scheme also involved the refurbishment of public houses, and the demolition and replacement of substandard premises. Most of the new premises were designed by the scheme's chief architect, Harry Redfern in his New Model Inn style, which influenced the design of public houses in the rest of the UK.

References

  1. ↑ Seabury, Olive (2007). The Carlisle State Management Scheme: Its Ethos and Architecture: A 60-Year Experiment in Regulation of the Liquor Trade. Bookcase Carlisle. ISBN 978-1-904147-30-5. Archived from the original on 2 January 2008.
  2. ↑ "New Research Reveals Legacy of State-Owned Pubs, Introduced to Prevent Excessive Drinking During the First World War". Historic England. 17 May 2021. Archived from the original on 17 May 2021. Retrieved 6 November 2026.
  3. ↑ Häggqvist, Henric (2 September 2026). "The state becomes a big-time brewer: public takeover of breweries in Sweden during the twentieth century". Scandinavian Economic History Review. 74 (3): 196–212. doi:10.1080/03585522.2025.2599560. ISSN 0358-5522.
  4. ↑ "Licensing (Abolition Of State Management) Bill - Hansard - UK Parliament". hansard.parliament.uk. Retrieved 6 November 2026.
  5. 1 2 Talbot, Philip (21 July 2015). "Disinterested Management: An Early Example of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)". International Journal of Social Science Studies. 3 (5). doi:10.11114/ijsss.v3i5.960. ISSN 2324-8041.
  6. ↑ Matthews, Steve (2 January 2021). "Changing the culture of drinking: the public houses in Carlisle before and after the introduction of The State Management Scheme in 1916". Folk Life. 59 (1): 18–35. doi:10.1080/04308778.2021.1893955. ISSN 0430-8778.

Further reading