IS A RACECOURSE A “PLACE”?

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume VIII, Issue 369, 19 August 1897, Page 9

IS A RACECOURSE A “PLACE”?

THE INTENTION OF THE ENGLISH LEGISLATURE. The discomfiture of the Anti-Gamblers by the decision of the Court of Appeal in the Kempton Park case has been rendered complete by a letter from Mr Charles Stokes, the promoter of the Betting Hours Suppression Bill which became law 44 years ago. That gentleman, who is now 71 years of age, has written as follows :— “ As it was I who suggested to the then Home Secretary, Lord Palmerston-, the plan for the suppression of betting houses I am acquainted with the feeling of the Government, and I am sure of the intei tion of the Legislature when passing the Bill. Of course, when the spirit and intention are not obtainable, then the letter of the law must be supreme. I thought by putting an end to ready-money betting houses I should cure the evil; but that per se it would interfere with people at Tattersall’s was far from my intention, or that of the Government as declared when proposing the Bill. Indeed, a Bill to put an end to ready-money betting pure and simple would never have passed through Parliament. The evil of betting houses was that they invaded every locality and made it tempting and easy for employees to risk their own money, and too often that of, their employers, whereas trusting a stranger without any local habitation was a deterrent. It was the depositing of money in conjunction with the ever present betting house, which constituted, in my opinion and in the opinion of the Government, the specific danger. The depositing of money other, than in conjunction with the betting houses was not the evil I supplied the Government with the remedy for ; nor was any such legislation desired by the Government. Racecourses were obviously no such ■ ‘place’ intended, for they are only open to the public for a few days, are ever at a distance, nor do they offer any such temptation as betting houses offered.” An English writer commends this to the reading of John Hawke, of Lapford House, New Barnet. It should be printed, framed, and presented to him. to bang in his bedroom alongside the portrait of his benefactor, Dr. Fleetwood Bury.