THE TOTALISATOR.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXIV, Issue 13934, 16 December 1905, Page 4

THE TOTALISATOR.

Another's correspondent writes to u& thismorning complaining of tiro excessive totaliraator commissions deducted by some of the smaller racing elute. By a clever manipulation of the “ odd money” and the “level shillings” some ■of these institutions manage to retain as much as 14 or 15 per cent in place of the legal 10 per cent. It is only the winners that have to pay; and as a rule the man who draws a dividend does not stickle over the' amount. He is too grateful for. his good fortune to quarrel with tne hand by which it is dispensed. But thematter is really a very serious one for investors. If they take £10(J)0 on to a racecourse, and pay 16 per cent commission on eight races, they will have only some £275 left at the end , of the day. Seventy-three per cent is a rather stiff 1 price to pay for having a “little interest” in the sport. The Canterbury Jockey Club might very well see that the clubs under its control observe the strict letter of the law in this respect. It is particularly punctilious itself in the distribution of dividends, and we can see no reason why it should allow any latitude to the suburban and country clubs. We are surprised, by the way, to hear that some of the stewards of the Jockey Club have taken umbrage at our playful suggestion that some members- of the community may wonder at their immunity when the Stipendiary Magistrate commences sending 1 bookmakers to gaol for competing with the totalisator. Our humour must have been of a very ponderous order. Our purpose, of course, was to emphasise the inconsistency of a law that encourages gambling on one hand and penalises it on the other. No one would seriously contend that the stewards of the Jockey Club should be packed off to gaol for using the means which the Legislature has placed at their disposal for providing amusement for the public. These gentlemen devote themselves with cheerful unselfishness to the promotion of the very best form of sport, and we are sorry indeed that any of them should have imagined that we included them in our condemnation ‘of ' the totalisator. Nothing could hare

been further from our thoughts, but evidently the subject is too serious to be joked about. *