TV POLICY HARMFUL

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30146, 1 June 1963, Page 12

TV POLICY HARMFUL

Decision Not Justified

[By o-it Rugby Correspondent',

One purpose of the meeting of the executive council of the New Zealand Rugby Unibn meeting tn Christchurch yesterday was to clarify the council s attitude towards direct telecasting of Rugby matches It has not succeeded.

Its decision to decline approval for the direct telecasting of the annual match between Christ's College and Christchurch Boys’ High School, a match played on a Wednesday and for which no charge is made at the gate, because there was a representative match being played at Timaru on that day, can only do Rugby harm in the eyes of the public. Most Rugby followers would agree with the council's dictum that there should be no live telecasts on ■ Saturday when major games are being played That is in accord with the council’s policy that the smaller unions should be protected against the attraction of live telecasts in the major centres.

But the council surely can not justify its decision to ban the telecasting of a Wednesdai school game because there is a representative match at Timaru. The action of the council on this matter looks suspiciously like a hope to. move Rugby into a twentieth century museum where it should remain overlooking that television is now as much part of the public entertainment as Rugby ft was unfortunate that Mi T. A Pearce, a Rugby administrator, who is an avowed and implacable enemy of television should nave received more suo port than the older and wiser heads on the council Mr Pearce’s contentton that once school games in Christchurch on a Wednesday are televised it would leave the way open for school games n Auckland on » Saturday to be televised, is untenable There is no connexion between the two cases and it was just as fatuous for the council to think that the telecasting of a school game tn Christchurch could affect the gate of a representative game tn Tlrrsru. The council at Its meeting yesterday had an opportunity to clarify its attitude towards television It is unfortunate that side Issues, such as a Wednesday school came, should have prevented them from doing this.