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… between BHA and PJA, over the whip rules. This must make a jockeys’ strike more likely.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/no … CMP=twt_gu
Richard Hughes‘s tweet reported here by Chris Cook is black humour, but has a whiff of bitter truth about it:
“The new whip rules must be working, the Bha are getting every jockey banned. Thats what their aim must have been”.The idea of the Horsemen’s Group, who have spent most of their time since they were formed in bitter confrontation with racecourses, helping to resolve this was nothing short of ridiculous. Best of all, as is pointed out in Chris Cook’s article, the PJA are part of the Horsemen’s Group that’s meant to speak collectively for members. Rather than mediation, what was stopping Dixon, Morcombe, Methven – or any other members of this merry band of Horsemen – helping to take proactive action to remove the current rules? We’ve been informed no horses, no product many times. How about no horses, no jockeys = no BHA?
One of the more interesting developments over the past 24 hours has been Struthers (we’re not all stupid) taking to Twitter behind the @BritishRacing account, not so much as to defend the current rules, but to attempt to twist Graham Cunningham’s original words on the topic. Of course, Struthers cited for personal abuse for de-Twittering, which wouldn’t be so funny if there wasn’t a block button. Clearly, popular opinion is something feared by the BHA hierarchy, and with Dave Yates taking to the platform regularly to berate the "Benny Hill Authority", the BHA’s new line of retaliation is to try and defeat media pundits and journalists in a game of semantics.
I too was amazed to hear that the Horsemens Group saw their role as one of mediation between ‘the two sides’.
I’m thoroughly fed up of this being painted as a BHA vs Jockeys issue. It is clearly nothing of the sort. That the rules don’t work is now obvious. That this impacts everybody with a stake in the sport ought to be equally obvious. What’s happening to the jockeys is merely a symptom of the malaise. The real battle is between the good of the sport and the contagion of bad regulation.
The fact that the Horsemens Group still has no position of its own on what is happening to the sport just goes to show how painfully slow so many people have been to think through and properly comprehend what’s at stake here. There are clearly a good many people who simply don’t get it yet.
The fact that the Horsemens Group still has no position of its own on what is happening to the sport just goes to show how painfully slow so many people have been to think through and properly comprehend what’s at stake here.
I suspect that if you ask any individual in the Horsemen’s Group their own personal opinion, I’m sure they would be pretty vocal and have strong views on what should be done.
Sadly most would probably be negative towards the BHA, who are meant to be the regulatory and ruling body, but appear to have provided little leadership or common sense on the issues that matter.
For an industry to even think of challenging its ruling authority, is verging on revolution and anarchy. Hence why the Horsemen’s Group have been collectively diplomatic in at least allowing the BHA to get their house in order, even though many of its members must be privately absolutely seething at the BHA’s failure on the levy, prize money and the whip rules etc, and the disarray that the sport is collectively in.
Thanks heavens there are some great horses and jockeys around at the moment to at least provide some comfort.
Agreed Sean , sadly there are too many who cannot see the bigger picture
In the old days we had the Jockey club who were useless at business but knew the horse game inside out , all were bred into it , racing was an integral part of their lives , but sadly were worse than useless at negotiating with the bookies for a funding model that worked
Now we have a racing authority full of businessmen who know nothing about racing at all , the game is in tatters and frankly no further progress has been made on the funding
I would rather have the Jockey club back , would we ever have blokes like Roy , Stier , and Struthers ….never , sadly we have the clowns and the game will not/has not flourished under their leadership or the lack of it IMO
Ricky
Now we have a racing authority full of businessmen who know nothing about racing at all , the game is in tatters and frankly no further progress has been made on the funding
Ricky, that seem to suggest that the "businessmen" don’t know anything about running business either, because racing’s financial model is shot to pieces for virtually every interested party or stakeholder – with the exception of the bookmakers.
Yes I meant exactly that , in short we have a bunch of numpties running our sport
Read what the last Chairman of the jockey club has said on the whip rules …that tells you everything
cheers
Ricky
Imo of course ……Numpties abound ….
Cmon Jockeys get the strike over and done with , this is killing the sport
Ricky
This is the view of the Chief Exec of the Horseman’s Group:
‘No horsemen are overly stressed about the need to restrict the
whip, however what was missed was the opportunity the BHA had to really understand the views of horsemen,’ he says. ‘The timing was
badly planned – you couldn’t have picked a worse time to start, just before the British Champions Day, and I would have favoured a trial
period for three or six months on the all–weather season and used the experience to refine it. What was really bad news is that jockeys,
who are mainly on a low wage anyway, were financially penalised at a level incongruous with any other sport – for what amounted to minor
infringements.
‘Some jockeys had been used to riding with a whip for 20 years so they need time to change. A whip is not an instrument of pain but one of
encouragement and in many cases it is used to keep horses running straight. From a PR point of view racing shot itself in the foot.’
The Horsemen’s Group is owned by and represents five established constituent bodies within racing – The Racehorse Owners Association,
National Trainers Federation, Professional Jockeys Association, National Association of Stable Staff and the Thoroughbred Breeders
Association. ‘The individual organisations all have their own business to look after so we are there to represent their combined common
interests, of which prize money is a very obvious priority,’ says Morcombe.
‘If I asked someone to guess the annual average salary of a flat jockey they wouldn’t get anywhere close. It’s less than £13,000 per annum.
Prize money underpins the whole industry and it needs to be better.’One of the more interesting developments over the past 24 hours has been Struthers (we’re not all stupid) taking to Twitter behind the @BritishRacing account, not so much as to defend the current rules, but to attempt to twist Graham Cunningham’s original words on the topic. Of course, Struthers cited for personal abuse for de-Twittering, which wouldn’t be so funny if there wasn’t a block button. Clearly, popular opinion is something feared by the BHA hierarchy, and with Dave Yates taking to the platform regularly to berate the "Benny Hill Authority", the BHA’s new line of retaliation is to try and defeat media pundits and journalists in a game of semantics.
I’ve also noticed a lack of communication recently both on here and on his twitter account by Mr Struthers, should his job title be renamed Non Communication director of the BHA?
When he does speak a certain scraping of the bottom of the barrel from him.
You the BHA are the regulator of the sport Mr Struthers, not the jockeys and not the Graham Cunningham or other journalists, stop trying the spread the blame out for your own (BHA) total incompetence.
Who was to blame for the total non communication cock up on National Day?I’ve also noticed a lack of communication recently both on here and on his twitter account by Mr Struthers, should his job title be renamed Non Communication director of the BHA?
When he does speak a certain scraping of the bottom of the barrel from him.
You the BHA are the regulator of the sport Mr Struthers, not the jockeys and not the Graham Cunningham or other journalists, stop trying the spread the blame out for your own (BHA) total incompetence.
Who was to blame for the total non communication cock up on National Day?He is officially on paternity leave, but the Twitter offerings were so much like him he must have a twin.
Either way, what a de-personalised account is doing playing word games with Cunningham off Sky+ recordings, I don’t know.
sorry to go back to basics, but:
if the BHA is famously the ROBL, ie its members are
– Racecourses
– Owners
– Breeders
– Licensed persons (trainers, jockeys, stable staff etc)and the Horsemen’s Group (according to its website) is
– Owners
– Breeders
– Licensed personsthen
a) is it the Racecourses who are driving these whip changes ?
or
b) is it the directors / executives of the BHA on a major disconnect with their own members ?
or
c) something else ?
anyone can make a mistake but why isn’t this fire being extinguished ?
is the delay just a question of saving someone’s face ?
if so, whose ?
they must be very important to be so much bigger than the sport ?
Excellent post wit.
Who are Roy, Stier and Struthers responsible to and why are those 3 still in a job? They must be doing a good job in someone’s view that matters but who?
Names?- Total Posts 17716
Thoughts from
Andrew Thornton
:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/no … whip-rules
"I’ve never known the weighing room so depressed…"
with no end in sight to the impasse. His answer: more strokes, more flexibility, reduced and sensible penalties for such minor offences.
it is (b), wit.
Paul Roy has set his stall out to lead the world in racing regulation and administration.
Unfortunately, on levy / prize money and now the whip debacle, he has failed miserably after 5 years in the job.
Apparently he is paid a six figure sum for a part-time job, probably the equivalent of £1/2m salary per year.
Add to this a total conflict of interest with his investment company owning shares in Betfair. How can he be involved in levy negotiations or in increasing the voluntary contributions made by Betfair with his company having a stake in the exchange?
I am staggered that the "members" of the BHA as you have listed have not removed Roy and at least some of the Board.
Hi MV
interesting that you say (b) because purely on paper it would appear to be (a) – the racecourses.
i know the racecourses seem largely to have kept their heads below the parapet and let Roy take the flak, but consider the composition of the BHA:
it has four members at the "shareholder" level (though its technically a company limited by guarantee rather than by shares):
– the Racecourse Member – 3 votes
– the Racehorse Owners Member – 1 vote
– the Throughbred Breeders Member – 1 vote
– the Licensed Personnel Member – 1 voteit has eight directors of following backgrounds:
1) John Bridgeman
– 05/10/1944 – ex-Regulator (Director-General OFT)2) William Farnsworth
– 14/07/1968 – Racecourse Manager – Musselburgh3) Morag Gray
– 12/10/1962 – ex-Racecourse Manager – Ayr/Hamilton4) Dennis Gunn
– 03/04/1944 – ex-Policeman (Met and Cambridge)5) Mark Johnston
– 10/10/1959 – Racehorse Trainer – Middleham6) Nicholas Jones
– 27/10/1946 – ex: National Stud / Ladbrokes/ Newbury racecourse7) Paul David Roy
– 08/05/1947 – Racehorse Owner /Investment Banker – Surrey8 ) Justin Wadham
– 17/02/1952 – Breeding/Training ("Mr Lucy Wadham") – Newmarket(There was a ninth, Nick Coward, the Chief Executive, who resigned 1st April 2011, presumably to be replaced when new CEO starts work.)
looking at the racecourse influence in that lot, might the real story be that the racecourses have quietly decided that the Walt Disney sensibilities of their diners / drinkers / family picinickers demand changes to the racing backdrop to their fundamental business of hospitality ?
if so then the problem for racing is far more serious than any issues with Roy or Animal Aid. what hospitality business wants anything that might involve horses with broken legs, flat or jumps ?
looking at the racecourse influence in that lot, might the real story be that the racecourses have quietly decided that the Walt Disney sensibilities of their diners / drinkers / family picinickers demand changes to the racing backdrop to their fundamental business of hospitality ?
An interesting theory Wit.
I would suggest a fair number of the hospitality guests would not be able to differentiate a racehorse from a carthorse (that comment would probably apply to at least 50% of the
total
racegoers at Chester)
Although making general assumptions is dangerous I would also venture to suggest, in my experience, at least 50% of those who make use of corporate hospitality do not even bother watching the racing and have no interest – they see it as a day away from the normal routine.
I was at a recent meeting where there was a big corporate event tied in with the racing but by the third race most of the guests had gone home.
Indeed there are some courses where they do not even make any attempt to house the hospitality in areas where the racing can be seen.
Quite a few press rooms are located amongst hospitality areas and it is quite depressing to see how few actually do come out to watch the racing (and that’s ignoring the boxes used by the in-running bods)
It’s worth noting, but no real surprise, one course manager admitted, albeit "off the record", that the racing is a loss leader and their profit comes from non race day activities.
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