BOOKMAKERS' PHONES

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXII, 10 December 1938, Page 10

BOOKMAKERS' PHONES

j CUTTING OFF OF CONNECTIONS DEPARTMENT DEFERS ACTION l United freed Asbociattonl PALMERSTON N., 9th December. Persons recently convicted of bookmaking in Palmerston North, were notified by the Chief Postmaster, Mr A. N. Wallace, in a letter dated Bth December, that their telephones, numbering nearly 30, would be disconnected as from 4 p.m. to-day. Mr Wallace was acting at the instruction of the Postmaster-General, Mr Jones. However, late this afternoon the persons concerned were notified that this action would not be taken in the meantime. It is understood that the telephone (subscribers concerned pay about £2500 J a year to the Post and Telegraph De- ( partment. To outward appearances the | department would have lost this amount every year, but in actual fact lit was thought improbable that the i action would have either curbed the * activities of the bookmakers or resulted in any great reduction in the revenue of the post office because it appeared that there was nothing to prevent a bookmaker installing another telephone at the address of an agent. The. first intimation that the telephones were to be disconnected came in the following letter:— Post Office, Palmerston North, December 8. Dear Sir, —In view of the recent court action against you the Post-master-General has directed that the telephone connection held by you be withdrawn. The service to telephone No. will be discontinued from 4 p.m. on Friday the 9th instant. Yours faithfully, A. N. Wallace, Chief Postmaster. When approached to-day the chief postmaster declined to make any comment beyond that he was acting under instructions. A leading Palmerston North bookmaker said he believed the whole trouble dated back to the time when one of their number, who already had two telephones, demanded a third. Nearly all of them had two telephones and one even had five. He estimated that 14 bookmakers in Palmerston North rented, among them, 27 tele-1 phones, and paid more than £3OO a! year in rental and more than £2OOO a I year for toll calls. The notice from the Post Office had come as a bombshell, he said. Later, however, when considering the posii tion before the “stay of proceedings” was granted, they were more amused j than perturbed. They would be) slightly inconvenienced, he said, but I would install telephones at their agents’ premises and carry on with out any serious loss of business.