FUTURE OF TROTTING.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 161, 10 July 1928, Page 8

FUTURE OF TROTTING.

PRESIDENT OPTIMISTIC. A WORD FOR THE PRESS. (By Telegraph—Special to "Star.") WELLINGTON, this day. "I wish to commend the New Zealand Sports Protection League to the support of all flubs and their members. The league, representing, as it does, all branches of sport, provides an organisation whereby the interests of each ean be collectively promoted, and their respective disabilities effectively placed before the authorities responsible," said Mr. H. F. Nicoll, in his presidential address at the Trotting Conference today. "It is the function of the league to protect our present statutory privileges, to assist in the removal of harmful legislative restrictions and to help in securing some relief from the present excessive burden of taxation. With these objects in view, it is necessary that tho Government and Parliament should comprise sensible men who are not unfavourable to our sport. This is election year, and such a result can best be obtained by co-operation with and support to the New Zealand Sports Protection League." Those responsible for the good government of the sport, and included in this category were the officials of clubs, as well as members of the New Zealand Trotting Association, and the conference, were rightly open to criticism, and, having undertaken the onerous task of stewardship, must expect the gentlemen of the Press to comment upon what they did, and upon what was left undone. Taking the Press throughout the Dominion, they had reason to be satisfied with the support received, and with the intelligent review of the manifold occurrences throughout a season. The Press was a powerful factor in their life, and should be supported by all, and, in turn, they looked to the Press for their co-operation and assistance in the many difficult problems they had to consider. "We are justified in being optimists with regard to the future of our sport. Despite the disabilities under which we suffer, and they are more serious than the casual observer would imagine, I claim that, in addition to the immense influence we have in the upkeep of the horse-breeding industry, we are providing a pastime that offers recreation iind diversion to the multitude. Those <>f us who have seen trotting elsewhere agree that we are right up-to-date in our methods and management, and that the public are catered for better in New Zealand than in any other country. The same spirit of interest and enthusiasm is apparent in all the trotting centres one visits around the country, and we only need a little more consideration from Parliament in order to relieve many clubs from their financial anxieties, and to make us a contented party. Let us all continue to work together in the same unselfish and intelligent spirit in the future, as has been evidenced by our past conferences, and we need have no doubts but that trotting will continue to add to its adherents, and to justify the place it holds in the national life of sport today."