RANFURLY SHIELD WEEK-END.

Evening Star, Issue 22722, 9 August 1937, Page 12

RANFURLY SHIELD WEEK-END.

SO TEX EDITOR. Sir,—That phase of the Ranfurly Shield week-end in Dunedin, the “ annual boozeroo ” (nothing less), fostered and organised by liquor interests, was again a hug© success from the viewpoint of liquor profits of the trade. When tickets are distributed to care-fully-selected people, allowing them accommodation m hotels at about _ a quarter or less of ordinary rates, is it to be wondered at that hotels are crowded with, guests as thick as sheep in trucks, and that scenes of drinking and debauchery continue from Friday afternoon to Monday morning, inclusive? Surely operations on these lines are nothing less than systematic conspiracy to defeat the terms and spirit of the Licensing Act. Of course, liquor sellers make from 20 to 30 times more profit out of their drinking guests than the amount represented by “ accommoda-tion-rebate.” Drink and drinking have never been any help to Rugby or any other sport;.in fact, wherever occumng they have been a nuisance and evil to spectators, players, and the sport itself; hut when tne liquor traffic systematically seeks. to prostitute the Rugby game to “ profit interests of the trade, it is surely high time for lovers of the good old gam© to sit up and act. This drinking and intoxication, so apparent at Cambrook, is a cancerous growth attaching itself to the game, fostered by the liquor interests, and requires immediate and drastic remedy. Surely there are enough clean sports on the executive to take the necessary measures ? Or have the tentacles of the liquor octopus enmeshed enough, of them to prevent action? Intoxicating liquor should be barred from being taken on to tho Carisbrook and other grounds, and all apparently intoxicated persons kept off. That only will put tho Rugby Union on side. The union should realise that the parents of this province cannot afford to rear, train, and educate their sons only to have them become “ profits fodder ” for the drink trade, and that secured to them through sports avenues. As a player and follower of Rugby from youth up, I feel sure of the support of all true lovers of the game in this protest. Never in 50 years of my presence and experi - ence in the centre of the city, it is safe to affirm, has there been apparent such a prevalence of drinking, intoxication, and drunkenness as over the week-end referred to, the most distressing and pitiable feature of all being the large number of mere youths under the influence of drink.—l am, etc., Alaemed Citizen. • August 7. TO TEX EDITOR. Sir, —In regard to the controversy on the question of drunkenness during the week-end in which Otago played Southland for the shield, I agree with those people who say that it was a shameful affair, but I think that the most important and disquieting aspect has been overlooked. On this particular point I wish publicly to ask the local chief of police, in view of the fact that hotels were open right over Saturday night and Sunday, and. I am led to believe that extra hands were employed over that period, will he tell the public why it is that not one publican was prosecuted? I noticed a young man was prosecuted the other day for stealing paipers to the value of Is Bd, yet publicans are allowed to break the law in order to make huge profits out pf a sporting fixture.—l am, etc., F. M’Comish. August 7. [Superintendent Rawle points out that during the week-end •in question approximately 16,000 people from Southland and elsewhere had to be accommodated in Dunedin. All the hotels were completely booked out, some of them receiving exceptionally large numbers of guests in an endeavour to meet the demand. The law provides that bona fide lodgers in hotels may. be supplied with liquor by the licensees at any time, and that such residents are allowed to entertain guests.—Ed. E.S.j