The Barber Got Fifty To One

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 674, 28 May 1929, Page 12

The Barber Got Fifty To One

TOTALISATOR BETTING DISCUSSED BY C.J.C. The matter of installing a single bet- : ting totalisator was discussed at last i week’s annual meeting of the Canter- ! bury Jockey Club. Mr. J. S. Barrett, who introduced the subject, expressed the opinion that it ! would be advisable for the club to sup- ; port those who were working for the ' amendment of the Gaming law. The chairman (Mr. George Gould) ! said Air. Barrett had referred to a mat- j ter that had engaged the attention o; ■ the committee. There was the ques- ! tion of providing the public, and owners I more particularly, with an opportunity if they wished, for straight-out betting about any horse instead of the usual betting for first or second place. It was a custom in many parts of the world—in India and the East, where j they had totalisators only, and in places j where they had bookmakers—for a j large proportion of the betting to be ; for a win. It seemed to him that in ! view of the small stakes in many places the opportunity would be welcomed by i owners who might occasionally like to have a decent bet about a horse. “I can j tefl you.'' he added, “from my experi- j erice that it is pretty hard to make racing pay on the stakes at the country meetings, and it is pretty hard to win at the country meetings.” Two Machines They had, he said, the old hand-oper-ated tOtalisator, and they could very easily try this plan out by putting up this totalisaor beside the other one, and operate it for a quarter of an hour when the field consisted of more than five, closing at five minutes before the other tOtalisator so that it could be balanced as soon as the other one. People would then have the option of betting straight out for a win or betting for a place. He had been rather keen j upon this, but he had just read in a i paper that it was tried in South Aus- i tralia, and that the straight-out ma- \ chine got no patronage whatever. ( That was a surprise to him. He did not j wish to urge this method on the clubs at all. But he thought there were a number 1 of people who would like to have a straight-out bet, but in the light of the experience in South Australia one felt diffident in urging the matter. He did not understand why a method of betting adopted in all parts of the world would not find favour here.

Providing Competition One great advantage to his mind was that it would place the tOtalisator in a better position to compete with the bookmakers. There was an enormous amount of betting going on with bookmakers. A man could get a straightout. bet today with a bookmaker. He thought they would be putting the legal form of betting on a better footing to compete with the illegal form. Mr. J. S. Barrett: My barber told me that he got 50 to 1 the other day from a bookmaker. The Chairman: What does that prove? Mr. Barrett: You could not get that off the totalisator. He told mo that he got 50 to 1 on Wrackler and another horse. The Chairman : It will be for the new committee to consider and decide whether the experiments shall be made. Mr. AY. Anderson: The club could very well support the Bill before Parliament. The Chairman: Oh. we have done that —the publication of dividends and wiring money to the course. Mr. C. W. Hervev expressed the opinion that the meeting should give its support. Mr. Barrett: It would not be amiss if we supported the publication of dividends and the wiring of money to the course. He moved to that effect. The motion was carried. Sir Heaton Rhodes said that he was in favour of the single betting totalisator. The Chairman: T was rather disappointed by this report from South Australia. I was confident in my own mind that it was worth trying, but I do not want to court failure. Sir Heaton Rhodes: Owners have complained that the totalisator dividends have been spoiled by the second dividend. I would like to help them. The Chairman: I think the present

method of betting is an excellent thing for ordinary people, who go to amuse themselves, and want to have a small bet on every race.

Mr. H. A. Knight considered that the explanation of the failure in South Australia was that, although bookmakers were not licensed in that State, there were bookmakers all over Australia.