GIVING THE BOYS A SHOW

Otago Witness, Volume 25, Issue 2321, 25 August 1898, Page 35

GIVING THE BOYS A SHOW

At the V R.O. annual meeting an addition was made to rule 84-, by which a jockey who has been refused a license, or has been suspended, may be engaged in any training stabla without his employer incurring a penalty. The principle here embodied seems to be » sound one. When a rider loses his license, the loss ought to be the measure of punishment for the particular offence which he has committed. It is not fair to add to that definite punishment the indefinite one of depriving him of other means of making a living. Tho injustice of such a system is obvious on a moment's consideration A.B. and Y.Z., riders of equal ability and opportunity, commit mutually a turf offence and lose tt^ir licenses for, say, six months. So far the penalty applies with equal severity Add to this sentence that neither is to be allowed to work in a stable while under the ban, and it is long odds against the punishment pinching both to the same extent. A.8., for instance, has friends who are willing and able to maintain him while he stands down, or they may be in a position to provide him with some other employment. Y.Z., on the other hand, is landed " on his knuckle bone," as the saying goes, and sees before him only the option of begging or stealing. In other words, one of the offenders can afford to regard his suspension as more or lees of a holiday, while his companion in the offence has a deuco of a. time of it, and possibly enough sows the seeds of future trouble. I make a point of this-l inequality of suffering as a strong objection to? the ordinary rule on the subject, and woulc^ avjniQ that our racing law gbaulid be ridded

of the old notion and brought more into line with the common penal legislation, which expressly aims at putting convicted persons to work, it being recognised that idleness is the beginning of much that is ovil. I plcrm Jus ivay because I realise that the majority of our riders come of poor families, and because we all know perfectly well that five jockeys out of six are absolutely useless aparo from then one mode of Jiving about racing sables. I ■am not, it must be confessed, ready with cases 'in point so far as New Zealand is concerned. Fox- one thing, our riders are as a class a very decent lot of fellows, and they don t readily so wrong. It is quite rare to find a recognised iockey in the hands of the police on any charge. Another reason for the scarcity of shocking examples is that the racing rule on ihis particular subject is not very rigidly enforced. Still, the rule exists, and, inasmuch as it may at any time be. put into operation, and be the means of forcing a lad to devious Sourses in order to get a belly ul, I hope to see this colony adopt the Victorian plan, which seems to me to be just, humane, and dustrie.