PACING RESTRICTIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIV, Issue 16673, 18 October 1917, Page 4

PACING RESTRICTIONS.

SOUTH ISLAND EVASION, KUROW MEETING AT OAMARU. ! PRECEDENT NOT ESTABLISHED. i fI!T TELEGRAPH—SPECIAL TORRESPO'CDE.VT.j I WELLINGTON. Wednesday. I A proposal regarding the issue of a tota'isator permit was made to the Minis- ' ter for Internal Affairs in the House of Representatives to-day. Mr. E. .7. Anderson (Mafaura) asked whether the Minister would grant a permit to the Wyndham Racing Club to race on New Year's Day 'on the Invercargill Club's course. He ■ understood that recently the Minister granted a permit to the Kurow Club to i race on the Oamaru course. This being i so, ho would like to see the same pri- • • 1 vilese extended to the Wyndham Club, because under the new railway time-table • it wa3 impossible for the horses to get to Wyndham and then to go to Invercargill to race, the next day. The Wyndham - meeJfiTg, he said, was realy a farmers' picnic. ! : The Hon. G. W. Russell said that the , totalisator permit to the Wyndham Racing Club to race or. the Invercargill course could not be granted. This would give j Invercargill an extra day, and would take ; away the whole effect, of the curtailment jof racing on that course. He was glad to ~>• . ! have an opportunity of referring to the '"' . j Kurow case. Every application that had j been made for a club to race off its own ■ course had been refused, and it was with I the utmost surprise that he learned a week or two ago that a permit had beengiven by the Department to the Kurow Club fo race on the Oamaru course. The • Kurow Club had applied for its permit in the ordinary way, without drawing attention to the fact that it was for racing at Oamaru. A few days before the races \ were to take place the secretary wrote a letter to the Department drawing atten- ': : I tion to the fact that the racing was to be at Oamaru. Tho matter then came ■'':: before him. He at once objected to the /.-;; •whole affair, because he considered that -K the permit had been obtained by unfair \i means. He found out, however, that. :•-,:''; there were only five days before the. meeting, and as the horse owners had; ■• probably made their arrangements hei?';l----o allowed it to pass, but he was not going : ). to allow a ; ece of sharp pnetice on ih „ part of the- Kurow Club to form a precedent for future concessions, i- _—__„_>__„«._ i, " "