TOTALISATOR FRACTIONS. ..

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1598, 9 December 1920, Page 18

TOTALISATOR FRACTIONS. ..

DIVIDENDS SHOULD BE PAID OUT TO THREEPENCES.

It is to be hoped, in the interests of fair play, that the protest which the Dunedin Jockey Club Committee are to make against the confiscation of the totalisator fractions by the State will set forth the argument clearly and forcibly. To the Dunedin Jockey Club it means a loss of about £1,300 a year. This is serious. There will be so much the less to spend on improvements. Ido not see how the taking of this money can be „ defended on any grounds. It belongs to the people who put it on the totallisator, and racing practice, assented to by investors, is to pay it out for the benefit of racing generally. If they had a voice they would object very strongly to giving it to the State which amounts to sharing it with those persons who are forever unfairly attacking and misrepresenting the national sport. If the State has any show of right to capture this money, apart from the right of might, it may with equal justice collar the indivisable fractions of companies and corporations, and also the pocket money of husbands and wives, giving no better reason than that the State wants it so that extravagance may be paid for. One might justifiably become angry over this question. One of the basic principles of taxation is that ■ the State takes money for services rendered. What service does it render racing. It does nothing but worry and oppress, in weak submission to killjoys, who would, if they could, stop a man smoking and all other pleasures. It seems to me that one way of replying to this grab is to pay out dividends to threepences instead of. sixpences, if such can possibly be done. I suggest that the D.J.C. committee confer with Mr. W. F. James and see if this would be possible.