SUPPRESSION OF GAMBLING.

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVI, Issue 43099, 1 June 1907, Page 4

SUPPRESSION OF GAMBLING.

The effectiveness of the Gaming Suppression Act passed last session is being demonstrated beyond all doubt (says the Melbourne correspondent of the Sydney Daily Telegraph. Recently its drastic provisions closed up the Collingwood tote, which had ' * defied the law for years, and also City Tattersail’s Club and other similar places. Now the strong hand of the law has fallen on the Chinese gambling dens of I Little Bourke Street and other localiI ties ini the heart, of the city. For i years these places have been, carried on regardless of police raids, fines, and! imprisonment, 'but the new law is rooting them entirely Out. There appears tlo Ibe a prospect, that the j Chinese quarter of the city may soon J be won back to white occupation, j and become a credit instead of a die- j credit to the city. Applications were' made to the Court under the Gamingl Suppression Act to declare about a' dozen premisss occupied by Chinese to be common gaming houses, and to “quarantine” them. The quarantine provision makes it an offence to enter, leave, or be found oul any) premises declared to be a common gaming house, and there are severe penalties provided. Since the notices were served by the polioe of their intention to apply to quarantine these dozen premises; the Chinese have vacated most of them. When,' the applications came on ,for hearing the owners of eight premises named were represented, and the hearing was postponed for a week. In four cases there was no appearance of the owners or occupiers,, and ■ the Court ordered the premises to be quarantined.