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New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume III, Issue 125, 15 December 1892, Page 4

The Canterbury Times in commenting on the proceedings at the recent Conference between the Dunedin Jockey Club and the Otago country clubs (to which we alluded last week), takes up the cudgels on behalf of the country clubs thusly; — Public opinion has decided without a very accurate knowledge of the subject that there shall be less racing. The rough and ready means for effecting this — suggested, of course, by the Metropolitan Clubs —is to raise the amount of added money and so extinguish a number of country meetings. The Metropolitan Clubs and the Proprietary Clubs, which have awakened public opinion to the necessity of doing something to save the reputation of the colony, are practically undisturbed. The country clubs, which might have gone on for years in the quiet enjoyment of their little meetings, are sacrificed to the greed of their larger rivals. They are offered up as an atonement, so to speak, for the excesses of Metropolitan and Suburban Clubs, and it is no wonder that their friends hint at a policy of retaliation. The Dunedin Club has proposed, as a way out of the difficulty, that the operation of the objectionable rule should be confined to a radius of fifty miles from a Metropolitan Club, and we believe this would meet with the approval of the country clubs; but the Metropolitan Conference has declined to make any concession, and the matter has drifted into a very serious position. It would be ridiculous to suppose that the minority will always be allowed to rule. The Country Clubs hold the balance of power, and only need a little organisation to obtain all they require.

A rather dangerous precedent seems to be likelv to be established down South, and while applauding the object which its promoters have in view, we think that to grant the favour they ask would be to raise a precedent of which unfair advantage might be taken on future occasions. It appears that several of the minor racing clubs of Southland as well as the Invercargill Racing Club, for whom Mr. H. Howells has for many years acted .as handicapper, have expressed a desire that some united acknowledgment should be made of his gratuitous services in the past, and have proposed that a complimentary meeting should be held in his honour some time this season. A difficulty lies in the way though in that were such a meeting held it would, according to Rule 22, have to be treated as an extra race meeting, and thus the club upon whose course it was held would have, under the Rules of Racing, to find an increased amount in stake money for the season. The question was referred to the Dunedin Jockey Club, as the Metropolitan club of the district, and they replied that while they themselves could not relax the rules, they suggested that the Southland Racing Club should apply to the Colonial Secretary for permission to hold this special meeting as a compliment to Mr. Howells, and for further permission to to have it specially exempted from the operation of Rule 22. The Dunedin Jockey Club intimated that if such sin application were forwarded to them, they would transmit it to the Colonial Secretary with a strong recommendation that the request be acceded to. Mr. Howells, we know, is an extremely popular and a very competent handicapper, aud no doubt the Clubs feel themselves bound in some way to recognise the services he has rendered them, but a question arises as to where, if the present application! be granted, this sort of thing will end. The totalisator has been misused enough in the past by proprietary clubs, who might, if the Colonial Secretary could be found willing, indulge in bogus benefit meetings on their own account, and thus nicely evade Rule 22. It is on this account solely that we think the granting of a complimentary race meeting under the terms proposed is establishing-# bad precedent.