ILLEGAL BETS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 139, 15 June 1938, Page 16

ILLEGAL BETS.

WAGERS OFF COURSE.! STARTING-PRICE ODDS. GOVERNMENT PLANS CLEAN-UP. (From Our Oven Correspondent.) SYDNEY, June 8. Illegal betting on horse racing has greatly perturbed the New South Wales Government in recent months. In this Stave it is legal to bet on horse races, providing the wager is made on a lierased racecourse with a licensed bookmaker. To meet the demand ot small betters who were unwilling to go to the expense of attending a racecourse, a system of "starting price" wagering sprang up nu»ny years ago. A man with sufficient money to start a ''book" would accept small wagers and pay wagers on the winning or placed horses at starting-price odds. So long a.s this form of illegal betting was not widespread it did not constitute a problem. During the depression, however, it became almost universal. Elaborate networks oi runners, telephones and telegraphic communications have been laid down, betters found that sometimes a betting coup can be better arranged through the "S.l\ shops" than on the course itself. Wagers are accepted from, and in some cases by, children. • Hie New South Wales Government intends to act along the lhies of the Queensland legislation. As a lirst step it has proclaimed a number of hotel-; (which notoriously are hotbeds of illegal bettingi common gaming houses and has threatened so to proclaim others. Hotelkeepers have decided to cease broadcasting race results, and to eject runners for "S.P." bookmakers.