In 1828 the various Acts relating to the licensing of public-houses were consolidated, and the control of them was made more stringent. Two years later a new and most unfortunate departure was taken. With the hope of causing people to abandon the drinking of spirits, Parliament determined to encourage the sale of beer; and an Act was passed permitting any householder to open a beer shop on paying an excise fee of two guineas. The consumption of beer rose twenty-eight per cent. in consequence; but it was soon found that this, in place of checking the rush to spirits, aided it; and the increase in the spirit trade was even greater than that in beer. The number of houses for the sale of intoxicating liquors rose from 88,930 to 123,396; and many old inns, that formerly had been respectably conducted, were now driven by the stress of competition to very doubtful means for the promotion of their trade. At the same time crime showed a great increase, and, to quote from a Report of a Committee of the House of Lords, "The commitments for trial in England and Wales in the years 1848-49 were, in the proportion to those of 1830-31, the two first years after the enactment of the Beer Act, of 156 to 100; that this is not a mere casual coincidence the Committee have the strongest reasons to believe from the general evidence submitted to them, but more especially from that of the chief constables of police and the chaplains of gaols, who have the best opportunities, the one of watching the character of the beer shops and of those who frequent them, the other of tracing the causes of crime and the career of criminals". The Report of a Committee of the House of Commons in 1854 was still more emphatic. "The beer shop system," it said truly, "has proved a failure."