Tour followers kept away from Lions

Press, 13 June 1977, Page 1

Tour followers kept away from Lions

By

KEVIN McMENAMIN

Discontent has been simmering within the new's media party travelling with the British Lions rugby tourists about hotel bookings in New Zealand. This reached boiling point yesterday, when all but two of the group were excluded from the team’s Christchurch hotel, the Avon Park Motor Hotel.

The two who did gain entry Were Paul Cavanagh, of the New Zealand Press Association, and John Howson, of Radio New Zealand. Under the tour agreement, both these organisations are entitled to have a representative in the same hotel as the team.

It was only at the start of the tour that the big British press contingent discovered that it had been booked into other hotels from the Lions. The same applied to some New Zealanders, although others had booked privately into the team hotels as far back as last year. In some cases the British journalists were able to change bookings to the team’s hotels. At the same time, the excuse given for the separation was that it had been asked for by the four home unions, for reasons still unknown.

Yesterday, however, the

situation changed dramatically. Members of both the British and New' Zealand parties arrived at the Avon Park to fulfil bookings made either by themselves or by travel firms on their behalf. Some had chits confirming the bookings.

There were no rooms for them..— with the exception of the two official media representatives, they had all been rebooked, without advice, into the Avon Park’s sister hotel the Avon Lodge Motor Inn, about a mile away. The switch was seen by those affected as a serious infringement of their rights, particularly in the cases where the bookings were made privately and individually. “If we were Maoris we could, claim that we were being discriminated against,” said one. Why the ban suddenly took full effect in Christchurch is not known. In some cases, the booking applications gave no hint about occupations, and it can be assumed only that someone went through the list and sorted out those tour journalists.

The president of the Canterbury Rugby Union (Mr R. W. Thomas) said his union had not been involved, and although he is a councillor of the New Zealand union he said he

could not speak on behalf of the national body. According to staff at the hotel, the instruction to move the press out had come from the New Zealand union. The secretary of the New Zealand union (Mr J. Jeffs) confirmed last evening that the Home Unions had asked that the news media be kept away from the team; and when he had booked the team’s accommodation he had made this fact known to the hotels concerned.

The Lions management had been involved in the request, said Mr Jeffs. This has constantly been denied, as it was last evening by the team’s manager (Mr George Burrell). Mr Jeffs agreed that the New Zealand union has acted as an intermediary for the Home Unions in the matter. He seemed in sympathy with complaints that no organisation had the right to interfere with an individual making hotel bookings when and where he Dieased. He said he had taken no action on the matter, apart from the original request when the bookings were made.

He could not explain the total ban at the Avon Park.