THE BOOKMAKERS’ GRIEVANCE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XCVII, Issue 11187, 8 February 1897, Page 5

THE BOOKMAKERS’ GRIEVANCE.

The decision of the Chief Justice in the Ryan case on Saturday was "based on a technical defect in the information and has no direct bearing upon the long-standing dispute between the racing clubs and the bookmakers. It is to be hoped, however, that the appellant will lake heart of grace from his success and by initiating civil proceedings in the higher court finally determine the powers of stewards, - These gentlemen have lately assumed an authority that may well be regarded as a menace to individual liberty. They are not satisfied with having , the gambling field to themselves through the agency of the totalisator, but insist that everyone who makes a profession of betting shall he excluded from their racecourses. "We have no sympathy with the bookmakers, or, for the patter of that, with the totalisator, but it seems to us that it •is a very dangerous thing to clothe a few irresponsible gentlemen with such arbitrary powers. It is perfectly fair, of course, that they should have the right to prohibit betting within their own enclosures; but it is simply monstrous that they should be able at their own sweet will to exclude even from a public reserve any wellbehaved citizen whom they may suspect of a readiness to “ lay. the odds.” The public can no longer be deceived by drawing nice distinctions between one, form of betting and another. They know that when examined from a strictly moral standpoint they are equally foolish and vicious. The main difference appears to be that under one system the gamblers’ money finds its way into the pockets of the bookmakers, and under the other into the pockets of a few wealthy horse-owners. The latter is, perhaps, on general grounds, the less of two evils; but its advantages are not great enough to reconcile the public to a positive injustice.