FALSE NEWS CABLED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 59, 10 March 1932, Page 10

FALSE NEWS CABLED.

SMITH'S SPEED ATTEMPT

STRONG PROTEST BY A.A.A,

At last night's meeting of the A.A.A. council it was decided to write to the Postmaster-General and to the Prime Minister regarding the cabled report appearing in an English newspaper that "Wizard" Smith had attacked but failed to break the world's one-mile speed record. , Mr. H. H. Butcher, the associations representative in the speed trial arrangements, said that the sending of such a cable appeared to be almost a national affair. It belittled not only the association but the whole project, as it suggested that Mr. Smith had failed and that the association had connived at keeping the failure secret. He suggested that the Postmaster-General be asked to reveal the name of the sender of the cable.

The president, Mr. A. Grayson, made an alternative suggestion that the association write to the paper that published the report, saying that the news was false and asking who had sent it. On the motion of Mr. Butcher, it was decided to write to the PostmasterGeneral asking that the sender's name be given, and also to write to the Prime Minister pointing out that such a cable tended to throw discredit on all cabled news from the Dominion, and asking him to instruct tho High Commissioner to publish in English papers that no attempt was made.