ART UNION PRIZES

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 659, 10 May 1929, Page 9

ART UNION PRIZES

REVERSION TO SPECIE NAPIER CLUB’S PROPOSAL Press Association XAPIER, Thursday. The Napier Thirty Thousand Club todav approached the Prime Minister, •Sir Joseph Ward, with a view to having it made legal to offer sold specie as prizes for art unions. The speakers said they recogm-'d that the holding of art unions with gold prizes was stopped by Parliament because the extravagant organisation consumed mo?t of the profit. In Napier the club paid all expenses and distributed the profits among sports bodies, or used them for effecting improvements in the town. Sir Joseph in his reply said that :t all art unions were conducted as m Napier there probably would not hat. been any need for prohibiting gold specie prizes. But in. many cases the organisation had been so extravagant and the distribution of tickets so indiscriminate that the profits were very small. For this reason Parliament had put a stop to it altogether. Sir Joseph, said he did not know if it would be possible to restore gold prizes, as once the right was taken away it was not the easiest thing t" have it resurrected. The matter was under revision, but if any change wer*> made it would be necessary that the administration of art unions should He in responsible hands, and each, art union confined to a small area.