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XIX. WAR MEMORIALS Progress has been made with the approval of community centre war memorials for subsidy. At the close of the year, 17 schemes, involving approximately £133,000 in subsidy, had been approved, and a further 59 schemes were under consideration. Of the latter, many had not advanced sufficiently to enable a decision to be made, and others were temporarily held up through some technical difficulty—e.g., over the vesting of the land—or awaiting the architect's sketch plans. XX. RACING For the current racing year ending 31st July, 1949, the allocation of totalizator permits is again the maximum of 240 days for racing and hunt clubs and 80 days for trotting clubs. Non-totalizator permits for meetings on 170 days "were issued for the year ended 31st March, 1949. Inspectors of the Department attended all totalizator meetings to ensure compliance with the law regarding the operation of the totalizator. Particulars of the investments and the details of the taxation thereon are published in the Monthly Abstract of Statistics. On the 9th March, 1949, a referendum on the proposal "that provision be made for off-course betting on horse races through the totalizator, by means to be provided by the New Zealand Racing Conference and the New Zealand Trotting Conference," was held. Of the total number of valid votes recorded throughout New Zealand, 424,219 were for the proposal and 199,406 were against the proposal. XXI. WAR FUNDS, 1914-18 The following figures summarize the number of and assets held by the 48 War Funds still registered under the War Funds Act, 1915 : £ s. d. 22 incorporated societies .. .. .. 216,427 11 11 7 Red Cross organizations .. .. .. 38,551 9 2 2 blind soldiers'and veterans'home funds .. 65,078 5 4 10 unincorporated societies .. .. .. 5,586 1 6 6 returned soldiers clubs .. .. .. 16,100 5 5 1 National War Funds Council .. .. .. 68,974 11 5 48 funds £410,718 4 9 Last year's figures were 50 funds holding £433,040 ss. 2d. XXII. ADVERTISING BRANCH The amount recorded for casual newspaper advertising over the twelve months ended 31st March, 1949, is £41,438 10s. 7d., which is an increase of £8,857 10s. over the total listed for the previous year. The Press Section sent an average of over 4,900 newspaper clippings weekly to Ministers of the Crown, Government Departments, and overseas posts. This is an increase of over 20 per cent.

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