PRIZES IN ART UNIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20251, 10 May 1929, Page 11

PRIZES IN ART UNIONS.

CHANGE IN LAW SOUGHT.

PRIME MINISTER APPROACHED.

[BY TELEGRAPH.—I'RESS ASSOCIATJON.] NAPIER, Thursday.

Tiio Napier Thirty Thousand Club today approached the Prime Minister, Sir Joseph Ward, with a view to having. it made legal to offer gold specie as prizes for art uuious.

Tho speakers said they recognised that the holding of art unions with gold prizes was stopped by Parliament because the extravagant organisation consumed most of the profit. But in Napier the club paid all expenses and distributed the profits among" sports bodies, or used them for effecting improvements in the town. Sir Joseph in his reply said that if all art unions were conducted as in Napier there probably would not have been any need for prohibiting gold specie prizes. But in many cases the organisation had been so extravagant and the distribution of tickets so indiscriminate that the profits were very small. For this reason Parliament had put a stop to it altogether. Sir Joseph said ho did not know if it would be possible to restore gold prizes, as once tho right was taken away it was not tho easiest thing to have it resurrected. The matter was under revision, but if any change were made it would bo necessarv that tho administration o art unions should be in responsible hands, and each art union confinod to a small area.