SPORTING ITEMS.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 9812, 23 August 1897, Page 2

SPORTING ITEMS.

_* Weekly Press and Referee."

(The totalisator is undoubtedly very popular throughout (his colony with all who "go a racing," and probably the machine, is a legal means of betting on racecourses, was never on a sounder footing in New Zealand than ib is at the present day. It is to be hoped, for the sake of the clubs and the public who provide the sinews of war, that we shall long continue to be able to derive the benefits that the totalisator can bestow on racing generally. The Colonial Secretary is nt present consicrering the recommendations of the Racing and Trotting Conference, as to the granting of totalisator permits, and we have no doubt that that Cabinet Minister will see fit to pay due attention to the words of the racing and trotting authorities, who should know what is best in the interests t>f the sport a3 a whole. While making out his lists we hope the Colonial Secretory will remember that those clubs who footer racing and trotting from a purely Bportrng standpoint will be considered before any institution that there is any doubt about being a genuine organisation for providing pure sport for sport's sake. We say this because there is a general impression tttnongst those in a position to judge that more than ono racing and trotting club in the colony is being " run " in the interests of their So-called stewards—that the clubs are proprietary concerns and nothing else. We have -no doubt of the Colonial Secretary's shrewdness, and a hint will be enough to put* him on his guard. We should hope tha* he will not either grant totalisator petrmits to clubs to hold a two or three days' meeting spreadeagled, so to speak, over Weeks. This is only a means of evading the 'Act, which says only a certain number of permits shall be granted in a season, and in the interests of racing there is not the slightest necessity for such long dra'arn out proceedings. From a money making- point of-view it may be all right, but we wish to ace only race meetings where the public want them, and not run in the interests of speculators. Then, again, the Colonial Secretary will no doubt see that clubs that give a large amount of money to flat racing mmongßt small horses will not, aa trotting clubs, secure totalisator permits to the detriment of genuine trotting clubs, organisations established solely for the purposie of fostering the great Amencan sport. A great deal of good can be effected by the Colonial Secretary by the way he distributes his permits. Let us set our faces right against all Borts of aport that is not promoted for sport's Bake. If the people of any district will not Bupporfc racing or trotting by their presence then ib is clear they do not want either, and there is no necessity for the existence of a clnb. And we do not want to bolster one class of sport up- with an illegitimate support simply for tho sake of gambling purposes through the totalisator. Let our watch-word be "sport for sport's sake," and let the conduct of our clubs be such as must disarm all opposition, and we will have the totalisator with us for many years to-come.

The benefits that racing clubs and their patrons derive from the totalisator are becoming known in all parts of the world, and every day brings forth fresh agitation for its legalisation in different countries. In New South Wales and Viotoria they ■'continue to move in the direction bo eagerly looked for by Wall-wishers of the Turf, andl a new Bill to legalise the maohine will bo introduced into the New South Wales Assembly. In Melbourne the movement :in favour of the machine is growing stronger and stronger, and to show what that large body of sporting men—the members of the V.R.C.—think, we have only to/say that at the election of committeemen a few days since, a hitherto popular member of that body, in Mr Frank Madden, nearly lost his seat through his opposition to the total, isator. Mr Maddens popularity, we are told, has been gradually on the wane ever since he commenced to oppose the movement for the legalisation of the machine, until we find hhn retaining his seat on the committee of the. club by a bare marjority of five votes, being last but one on the list, while at the previous year's election he was in thhed position. The unholy alliance of tha bookmaker and parson will always be- arrayed against the machine in —Australia, but it is generally agreed that it 01 only a matter of time before the totalisator "will be rearing its head at Flemington and Randwick. In America the totalisator wave is spreading. In some parts they have already started a system on the plan of tho totalißator, and writers who were liitherto opposed to pari-mutuels or totalisators are slowly but surely coming over to the ranks, and in many American papers .they are crying out now for the abolition of the bookmaker, and the setting up of totalisators. Certainly, from what we read, the bookmakers in most of the States seem to have a great say in the conduct of the proprietary courses, and if we are to believe the American writers — who, we know, do indulge sometimes in romance—then the bookmaker of America, as a general rule, is an '•"undesirable " so far as racing is concerned. Concluding a lengthy article on the situation, the Sacratnento Record Union, of July 9fch, says:—"But so long as bookmaking combinations, backed by wealthy men, continue to manage the racing of the country by having the horse-owners in their clutches, 6nancially, so long will horse racing fail to be the so-called * sport of kings.' It will remain simply the graft of the sport." The San Francisco Breeder «*i_t Sportsman is a warm advocate of the totalisator, and never loses an opportunity to make its advantages known. In an exhaustive article on "Racing and Betting Methods of»the Present" in its issue of July 17th, that Journal says:—"With the change in methods of betting and a stricter supervision ai the jockeys' room and its occupants, especially the valets, who are too often ' gobetweens,' racing can be made such a clean aport, such fairness insured, that thousands would lend their support where hundreds now attend. Our aim is not to crush to earth any man or set of men, but to insure honest racing as far as it lies within our power. Many bookmakers, in the opinion of a host of lovers of raoing, have resolved to make money, and some of them care little ■row they secure it. If safeguards could be thrown about racing, rendering fraud at a discount, and if a dollar wagered with a bookmaker would net tbe ticket-purchaser as much aa if placed in a mutnel box, we wonld say by all means let us have bookmaking, but any average racegoer, from actual observation, sees too many chances for fraudulent practices under the present plan, and.we do not believe that the results, in a financial way, are as satisfactory as if the totalisator or • block system' were used."

Apropos of what we have often written concerning totalisator-odds betting shops and their evils, Tlie Field winds up an article on the recent betting decision thus :—" Up to date the people of the land, as represented by Parliament, have not thought fit to condemn betting in the abstract, nor to veto it of itself; still less to forbid it on the turf itself, and at the racecourse side. Betting there, confined to those who are present there, is one thing ; while betting upon racing contingencies, carried on at a distance and away from the eceoe of action (in office* ox "place**

specially used by individuals for such purposes), is quite another proceeding. The latter induces dangerous gambling among persons who do not go near racecourses, and ia productive of improvidence and extravagance to an undesirable extent. The Legislature observed this in 1853, and sought to repress it as a new and growing evil, while, at the same time, heing fully aware of ring procedure on racecourses (the same then as now), and not attempting to interfere with that, nor to make all betting a criminal act in the abstract." New Zealand racing clubs do not seem inclined to set apart an enclosure on their courses for bookmakers to ply their business in. The latest judgment from Home would make it appear aa if there is no legal objection in the way of their doing so. If some arrangement could be come to with the reputable bookmakers to license them for enclosures on condition that they refrained from laying totalisator odds, and did all in their power to suppress illegal and illicit betting, probably much strife and annoyance would be avoided. We are certain that, though the known bookmakers are kept off the racecourses, there are plenty of agents unknown to the authorities laying totalisator odds at almost every meeting. Every factory and draper's shop has its " tote " layer, and some of them do business —and a lucrative one at that very often—on the courses. At Riccarton during the "National" meeting, although the known bookmakers were not allowed on the course, there were layers of the odds there, and they found plenty of patrons, too.

With reference to the latest decision in the betting prosecutions at Home, ilia simply " as you were," and as the judgment is what the Auckland magistrates are waiting for before giving their decision in the cash betting cases up there, we presume the minds of the Auckland bookmakers will now quickly be relieved as to their position. There is no necessity to dwell at any length just now on the reversal of the Hawke v. Dunn ruling, which has been brought about in this way. The case was not literally an appeal from the Hawke case, but from another, which raised, a similar issue (as to "place," and "u3er" thereof under tbe Act). According to an English writer, the Hawke case could not be further appealed against, and its ruling was binding or all judges of Queen's Bench, as a precedent which five judges had carefully sifted and decided, and which would not be re-opened by any co-ordinate bench. But it was possible still to invoke an opinion from a superior tribunal, viz., the Court of Appeal, and this was clone by a friendly action, where one Powell, a shareholder in Kempton Park, claimed to restrain the latter company from breaking the law by allowing betting in Tattersall's ring. It waß tried before the Lord Chief Justice, and there was no dispute as to facts. The ring was "enclosed," £1 paid by each person who entorod it, and ready-money betting was carried on there as a " business" by bookmakers, who strolled here and there in the ring, and who had no private locations therein. The Lord Chief Justice, influenced by the "Hawke" ruling, felt bound to issue injunction against the company for allowing this betting. From his ruling appeal was lawful, and by rules of procedure the case went direct to the Court of Appeal, and was expedited in its hearing because of the importance of the issue. Even if the case should never be carried to the House of Lords, at all events there is rest and respite for bookmakers for this season. We may say that five of the six Lords of Appeal were agreed as to the decision, Lord Justice Rigby alone dissenting. It is very important to note, with reference to the argument as to what was intended by the Betting Act of 1853, that the promoter of that Bill, Mr Charles Stoke 3, who is now in his seventy-first year, has recently thrown much light on the matter. This gentleman addressed a letter to the Master of the Rolls when the appeal as to " what is a place" was being tried, and the document is of such importance just now that a portion of it at least is well worth quoting here. Thus :—

As it was I who suggested to the then Home Seoretary, Lord Palmerston, the plan for the suppression of betting houses I am acquainted with the feeling of the Government, and I am sure of the intention of the Legislature when passing the Bill. Of course when the spirit and intention are not obtainable, then the letter of the law must be supreme. I thought by putting an end to ready-money betting-houses I should cure the evil; but that per se it would interfere with people at Tattersall's was far from my intention, or that of the Government as declared when proposing the Bill. Indeed, a Bill to put an end to ready

money batting pure and simple would not have passed through Parliament. The evil of betting houses was that they invaded every locality and made it tempting ar;d easy for employees to risk their own money, and too often that of their employers, whereas trusting a stranger without any local habitation way a deterrent. It was the depositing of money in conjunction with the ever present betting house, which constituted, in my opinion and in the opinion of the Government, the specific clanger. The depositing of money other than in conjunction -with the betting "houses was not the evil I supplied the Government with the remedy for; nor was any such legislation desired by the Government. Bacecovrses wire obviously no suc7i *'place" intended, for they are only open to the public for a fow days, are ever at a distance, nor do tliey offer any such temptation as betting houses offered.

There never was a doubt in our mind as to what was aimed at by the English Betting Act of 1855, on which no doubt Sir Robert Stout's Gaming Act to suppress ..talisater shops and what is termed " tote " betting is lased, and which we are sorry to find has been almost allowed to remain a dead letter. For what reason we cannot say.