BETTING-SHOPS?

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27212, 15 October 1949, Page 8

BETTING-SHOPS?

Sir, —With a Gaming Amendment Bill now before Parliament authorising the setting up of off-course betting agencies which a section of their customers can be depended upon speedily to degrade to the same level as South Australia’s notorious betting shops, a question of vital importance that arises is what Erovision, if any, is being made, possibly y way of a system of licensing of premises comparable to that by which the location of hotels is regulated, to enable local government authorities to ensure that such betting agencies shall be located only in positions where they will have the minimum of- scope to become sordid public nuisances to reputable citizens. This is a matter that cannot safely be entrusted to racing authorities, which are not interested in the maintenance of public order or morals, but merely In profits. If South Australia’s betting shops afford any warning of what is to be expected, and they undoubtedly do so, the street footpaths about the frontages of such betting agencies are going to become regular consorting places for many of the most disreputable characters and disorderly elements in the community. Drunken squabbles and brawls will be of frequent occurrence there, the ears of women and children passers-by will be continually assailed with more filthy and indecent language than at any other place in the streets, and passing among the loiterers there will be something of an ordeal for decent women and children. Such agencies should therefore be located only in streets which pedestrians at present have little occasion to use. The most suitable site for any betting agency in Dunedin would undoubtedly be in one of the buildings such as the present offices of the Department of Labour and Employment, which are reached by way of entrances from Dunbar street, which is the narrow street running from Lower High street to Stuart street at the rear of the Police Station. This street carries practically no ordinary gedestrian traffic, women and children ave no need to make use of it, and disreputable and 1 disorderly elements loitering about a betting agency there would be under frequent police observation.—l am, etc.. A. R.