ESTABLISHED 1875. Manawatu Daily Times. The Oldest Manawatu Journal. Conducted by E.D. HOBEN, Editor & Proprietor. Published Every Morning. WEDNESDAY. DECEMBER 4, 1907. GOVERNMENT AND THE BOOKMAKERS.

Manawatu Times, Volume LXIV, Issue 280, 4 December 1907, Page 4

ESTABLISHED 1875. Manawatu Daily Times. The Oldest Manawatu Journal. Conducted by E.D. HOBEN, Editor & Proprietor. Published Every Morning. WEDNESDAY. DECEMBER 4, 1907. GOVERNMENT AND THE BOOKMAKERS.

We are at a loss to understand the consideration being shown by the Government to the bookmakers. There was no public demand that bookmakers should be licensed and forced on the racing clubs. The only demand came from the bookmakers themselves, who wished to exploit the public, and from the "Puritans" who wished to use them against the totalisator as Sampson did the ass's jawbone. Yet we find the Attorney-General speaking to a deputation of bookmakers yesterday as though they represented some body of reputable opinion, even while he protested that they would receive no special concession. The very spokesman had been prosecuted by the police, and certain of them are known to have made large sums of money by the deliberate evasion of section 4 of " The Gaming Act 1894, "which-provides fine and imprisonment for laying '' totalisator odds.'' It has been notorious that ail have done it. In fact the price betting practised in Australia is almost unknown here, so that it is practically nearly all 'totalisator odds.'' Therefore the deputation to Dr Findlay consisted largely of known law-breakers, who asked the protection of the law where they considered it to be in their favour, though one of them—the wealthiest bookmaker in New Zealand—admitted that he was still bookmaking on the Auckland Races in spite of the passing of the Act. And the deputation might have informed the Attorney-General that their confraternity was freely doing business in Christchurch, and probably also in other centres on the Feilding Races, that the usual bookmakers' cards are being received in Palmerston from Wellington, and that the post office is being used to send money to bookmakers for betting purposes. All these things are illegal, yet we find the AttorneyGeneral declaring that he will forfeit the totalisator licences of clubs that do not encourage these lawbreakers with whom the police have in the past shown themselves qiute unable to cope. The Bookmakers protested to the Minister against being "roped in" as was proposed at Feilding. Yet they are btrictly confined to enclosures —often railed or fenced —and to particular spots on most of the Australian and English courses They are certainly not allowed to " call the odds " wherever they choose. The Attorney-General says that the purpose of clause 85 "is to put bookmakers on the course in no better and no worse a poistion than the totalisator.'' Let clubs take Dr Findlay at his word and build a "bookmaker house" like the totalisator house with a little window of totalisator type for each bookmaker licensed, so that the public can get just as much, and no more, contact with them as with the totalisator officials. Then let there be an official to be a " clerk of bookmakers" who would shut down the windows when the bell rings and not put them up again till the tote opens also. Tbat would be literal equality of treatment such as the Attorney-General indicates, -and it would also enable the officials to see that the bookmakers "paid out," just when and as the machine did. This would be the most effectual treatment that could be meted out and would, to some extent, prevent the very undesirable collusion of bookmakers and jockies just before a race, which is one of the curses of : the course where the bookmaker reigns. .