RESTRICTION OF BETTING

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 167, 10 April 1920, Page 8

RESTRICTION OF BETTING

THE NEW REGULATIONS

DUTIES FOR POSTAL OFFICERS

T.i-> now regulations reminding the uso for betting purposes of the services provided by the l'ost mid Telegraph Department wero a general topic of conversation in tho city yesterday. If these regulations are enforced, they will hamper considerably the operations of the bookmakers and tho people who bet with the bookmakers. Tho onus of enforcement'rests with tho Postmaster-General and his officers, who arc authorised by tho regulations to decide wlicro tho regulations shall bo applied. The most important of the new regulations is tho ouo prohibiting tho transmission, of "telegrams in plain language relating to betting or to investments 011 tho totalisator, or in coded language reasonably supposed to relate to betting or to investments 011 tho totalisator," Racing clubs have long been prohibited from accepting totalisator investments by telegram or telephone, but the new rule goes further and is intended to nmko it impossible for .betting telegrams to be sent to Ixiokmakers at any time. The enforcement of this rule will cut off a very substantial part of the business dono bv the bookmakers throughout New Zealand. The officer in charge of the telegraph office where the telegram is presented is to determine whether or not tho message infringes the regulation. The effectiveness of the regulation will depend upon the decisions of these.postal officers. The attitude of the Pest and Telegraph Department in the past has been that the restriction or prevention of betting 110 part of the Department's duty. Certain bookmakers have teen prohibited, iu consequence of police action, from receiving telegraph, postal and telephone facilities. But the Department has giwi no official recognition to the wellknowi fact that these bookmakers were enjoying all tlic facilities under other names than their.own. The PostmasterGeneral, during a recent session of Parliament, had his attention drawn to the fact that <1 certain bookmaker was wins' a private letter-box in the t\elliii"ton G.P.O. The Minister replied that the Department 1 ad no information on tho point, and there the matter euled The new regulations change the position materially by imposing upon the Pos;: and Telegraph Department a definite duty of preventing the use of Departmental facilities for betting, imposes. , .' . The regulations arc already in operation, and certain steps are being taken by the officers of the Department. But tito effect of these steps will not be known immediately. The regulations deal entirely with betting, and they do not prohibit the transmission of telegrams dealing with racing generally. The Departmental officers, it is anticipated, 1 will f'nd that the meaning'of telegrams 'presented to them is-not always obvious, and much may depend upon the inter-' pretation of the phrase "reasonably supposed," In the meantime many racing men are perturbed.