Racing authority supported

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32677, 5 August 1971, Page 8

Racing authority supported

Support for the introduction of a national racing authority is given by the president of the Canterbury Trotting Owners and Breeders’ Association (Mr S. C. Graham) in a statement issued yesterday. Mr Graham takes issue with. the president of the Canterbury Park Trotting Club (Mr S. C. Cordner), who at the annual meeting of his club said the authority was not acceptable to racing and trotting clubs and said he hoped that “other more desirable recommendations of the Royal Commission into Horse Racing, Trotting and Dog Racing be implemented.’* “It is very strange hbw the commission can be so right and yet so wrong in the eyes of Mr Cordner,” says the statement. “The commission gave as the reason for proposing such an authority: ‘To give the inspiration, which up till now the machinery of the industry has been unable to supply.’ “How, then, are the individual conferences going to improve to such an extent overnight that they feel cap-

able of shaping our destinies, whereas they have been sadly lacking in the past. I think they can be likened to the present All Black team—a bit of new blood and a few ideas might work wonders.

“If the stakes subsidy fund is implemented, it is to be administered by the authority, and would, then, be used wholly to increase stakes; not like the 2.68 per cent additional ‘take’ from doubles betting, which I am afraid, is not always used to fulfil its purpose,” concludes the statement.