NIGHT CLUBS

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 282, 25 August 1944, Page 4

NIGHT CLUBS

Auckland And Wellington DEMORALIZING INFLUENCE

The growth of night clubs in Auckland and Wellington is mentioned in the annual report on the Police Force by the Commissioner, Mr. D, J. Cummings, presented in the Houes of Representatives yesterday. The force, states the report, had been active in suppressing sly-grog selling under special police in both cities and they had done very fine work. Young girls in their teens were found in some of the night clubs the worse for liquor, continues the report. Such clubs were most demoralizing to young girls who frequented them. A number of the clubs were merely sloy-grog shops run under the guise of entertainment clubs for servicemen. The number of offences reported to the police during the year ended December was 33,192, a decrease of 1416 on the previous year, the percentage of offences to population being 2.02 compared with 2.11. Prosecutions for drunkenness haddecreased by 697, and those against hotelkeepers had decreased by 96. Sly-grog prosecutions numbered 403, the fines imposed totalling £2126. There were 529 prosecutions under the Gaming Act compared with 304 in the former year, and 212 convictions in connexion with bookmaking. the fines amounting to £9347. Very few recruits were now offering for the force and it was below the authorized strength by about 100 men. There were now 33 women police in the service, the majority being at Auckland and Wellington, and the others at Christchurch and Dunedin. They were doing excellent work among women, young girls and children and had been an outstanding success and an acquisition to the service.