THE GAMING ACT.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 875, 22 July 1910, Page 6

THE GAMING ACT.

SOME OF ITS EFFECTS. DENOUNCED BY RACING PRESIDENT/ Sir George Clifford, president of tlio New Zealand Racing Conference, in the course of tlie report which he read to that body yesterday strongly condemned the legalisation of the bookmaker, and made a spirited defence of the totalisator. "I • have," he said, "consistently expressed what I believed to bo the adverse opinion of the conference regarding the statutory enforcement upon us of the licensed bookmaker. It has been alleged that wo have not purified 'our statutory visitors by selection; the answer is, first— that selection was practically impossible,, and secondly—that, compelled to accept their presence, we have looked to them to purge their own ranks, "We have now lind sufficient experience of the Gaming Act, 1908, to gauge its results, and I affirm with confidence that it has wholly failed in all its ostensible purposes. It has benefited only one class —the bookmakers—whoso influence had, under tlio policy of tlio conference, been rendered insignificant, and whoso operations have, under the wing of this statute,, been restored almost to tho maleficent proportions. of the prc-totalisator days. Tho Act was, we were told, aimod at the suppression of betting outside racecourses, and evcryono knows that it has, as was inevitable, served to extend the bookmaker's circle of clients. Through the official rights accorded to him, it has brought him into contact with many of our trainers, jockeys, and stablemen, who previously held such intercourse derogatory, and it has lessened the previous unwillingness of owners to be known as parties to his transactions. It has. renewed the possibilities and suspicions of malpractices which had long been extinct on our courses, and it will, in time, debar the men wlio race solely for lovo of the sport from participation in it. Is it too. much to ask that an experiment condemned by such a representative body as this conference, and responsible for such disastrous consequences, should bo discontinued? 'But,' I hear it said occasionally, 'if-.you expel the bookmaker and revert to the conditions antecedent to the Gaming Act, the totalisator also may go_ the same way.' There is, however, no' logical sequence in this. The totalisator does not pit man against man—often the honest against the dishonest;-it does not cajole into heavier investment than tho careful holiday-maker has foreseen;. ..it deters the reckless from excessive speculation which would defeat itself bv diminished dividends, and its profits ar& a reasonable and voluntary subscription to a healthful, open-air recreation, hv those who participate in it. The distinction is manifest to us who know, and must be. equally so to any unprejudiced inquirer. "It is imperative for militaiy and economic purposes that a considerable supply of light horses should be obtainable, and in these days of motor traction it is more needful than erstwhile that th 6 sport of racing should be encouraged to secure the foupdation of a breed of suitable animals; tho industry is one for which these islands are specially fitted, and any needless interference .which may cramp the means or baulk the enterpriso of-racing clubs is, in the' interest ot tho community, to be greatly deprecated."