SPORTING.

Taranaki Daily News, 27 March 1917, Page 8

SPORTING.

SIR GEORGE CLIFFORD'S APPEAL, RACING OR NO RACING. ChristehurA, March 23. Sir George Clifford, chairman of the Racing Conference, in a memorandum to the chairman of the National Efficiency Board regarding racing and the ! war, 'points out that attendance at race i meetings does not deter men from en- ! listing, as the Legislature has averted ■ this. The preparation for race meet- ; ings does not affect the available labor supply,, as it is largely boy labor of a "type unfitted for farm work, while the work on those few courses which run to a permanent staff is done by elderly men. If the objection were I sound, which, he says, it is not, racing clubs would meet it by action less drasi tic than discontinuance. Eace meetings do not distract, public attention from ; the war, and he queries whether race | trains involve the employment of men I who should be fighting, pointing out j that the permanent necessary equipment : of the lines is such as to provide for the occasional services, either by calling in ! the whole strength or by overtime. Sir George points out that racing is a rev- , enue producer of no mean value, Last I yi>ar £251,667 was paid tlirectly into the .Exchequer, and £45,9'43 was voluntarily I contributed by racing clubs to war fund;. I The industry' is of national importance, for the supply of remounts, and ifs abandonment or curtailment would throw out of employment a horde of people whose aptitude and capability for otlKfr work is small, and would be a disaster to owners of stud farms. It is assuredly, he says, a libel on a sportsman to brand him as a shirker, for whatever branch of sport he follows makes for manliness and readiness to fight with bravery in his country's cause. Attendance at races is not a sign of a shirker, and any) of the breed calK be effectively conibccf at the entrance gates if the proper steps are taken. The most prominent and trusted of England's leaders are strenuous in support of such racing as is practicable ' there. His Majesty leads the wak? by his example, and Earl Derby, Lord Dabernon, Lord , , Sosebery, and'many other conspicuous war workers, practically testify to the importance of not endangering the existence of British /pre-eminence in this "> direction. New Zealand gives every I. Diomise of being indeed the Britain of tiie* South in similar success, and it I rests rvitß the Efficiency Board to proI tect so fair a prospect and one so fraught Tith military advantages.