by Brian de Lore
Published July 4th 2021
The willingness of TAB NZ to pull the wool over the eyes of the racing public became evident once again on Friday when it released a media statement claiming the credit for $30 million of income derived, not from the TAB, but the 2020 legislation.
The $30 million is made up $20 million from ‘racefields’ or BIUC (Betting Information User Charges) and $10 million from the repeal of the two percent betting levy – two of the 17 Messara Review recommendations written into the racing Act of 2020, and nothing whatsoever to do with the TAB.
The TAB’s announcement that budgeted distributions to the racing codes for the upcoming 2021/22 season will be 23 percent higher than the $117 million budgeted distributions for the current season is laughable.
$117 million budget was low-ball because of COVID19
The $117m set by the TAB for the current season was a low-ball budgeted figure set when there were significant uncertainties for the future of New Zealand’s wagering and gaming businesses because of COVID-19.
So, this budget for the current season is $33 million below what is required to fund the codes to enable them to maintain stakes at the pre-COVID level and the anticipated TAB betting profits for the current season.
All this smoke and mirrors carry-on was part of the Glenda Hughes-John Allen publicity machine under NZRB, and now with a name change to TAB NZ and under the Chief Transitional Officer Dean McKenzie, nothing has changed.
The chasm between reality and the fanciful world of Dean McKenzie is wider than the Grand Canyon. The participants of racing have only ever wanted to know the truth handed out by someone who is genuinely working in their interests – not some overpaid, self-serving egotist of the type we have seen succeed each other for the past decade.
In the media release, McKenzie said: “It’s great that we’re in a position to increase our returns…we’re now seeing the positive returns from the investment made by the Government and the industry in the TAB. We’re excited with where we are heading and incredibly proud that significant tangible benefits….”
He’s excited, is there anyone in the real world excited?
Under last year’s legislation, the devolvement of many areas of responsibility from NZRB/RITA/TAB NZ to the racing codes has not happened because the three codes have not come together, as the legislation provided for, to draw up a commercial agreement for the negotiation of distributions into the codes, etc..
Bringing in the Racing New Zealand board was new to the legislation, and invented explicitly to: “act as a consultive forum for the racing codes, and to represent the racing codes in relation to negotiations, interactions with other bodies under this Act, and other matters, with the agreement of the racing codes.”
However, Racing New Zealand cannot function effectively because it hasn’t been appropriately appointed. It’s supposed to have one person from each of the codes and two independents. But the two independents haven’t been appointed, and the codes have been running it on a please themselves basis in the first year by taking along the three CEOs – Saundry, Woodham, and Hughes – none of those three are supposed to be involved and shouldn’t be involved.
It’s all very well having newish, one-year-old legislation in place, but when you have an industry that deliberately ignores bits and pieces to suit itself, it’s no different to them claiming they’re doing the Messara Review when, in fact, it’s only cherry-picking the low hanging fruit and leaving out the vital clauses.
Some of our leaders haven’t even read the legislation
Having spoken to some of the decision-makers at various times, would it surprise that some haven’t even read the legislation, and if they have, have only skimmed over it and don’t get it. Not that we wouldn’t mind altering the 59 clauses that require Ministerial stamp of approval to do anything – knowing we have a Minister very short on industry knowledge (and appearances) and advised by non-specified interested parties.
Racing remains in a mess. NZTR has been weak and has seen a deterioration in its relationship with racing people trying to stay active in the game. NZTR CEO Bernard Saundry refers to them as customers, but he isn’t running a corporation; in reality, he‘s their employee and should support them and develop initiatives to keep people active in racing and breeding. The foal crop numbers prove that’s not happening.
Where’s the future plan? It’s July 4th, and as I write this we have no funding model for the clubs for the season starting August 1st. On Weigh In when last interviewed, Saundry suggested prizemoney increases for the middle and top races, and the bottom level had their turn three years ago. Why didn’t he just kick 90 percent of owners in the guts there and then?
NZTR puts pressure on Dargaville for $800,000 to $1 million
Arrogance on NZTR surfaces regularly. Consider the plight of the Dargaville Racing Club and the stand-off that now exists as NZTR tries to enforce Clause 25 of the Racing Act 2020, which specifically addresses the ‘Transfer of surplus venue by agreement.’
NZTR has its hand out for 40 percent of the value of the Dargaville Racecourse, which is valued at somewhere between $2 to $2.5 million. Dargaville is an isolated outpost over an hour by car west of Ruakaka. It had one annual community-driven race day but hasn’t had a date allocated for four years. The club resisted taking their race date to Ruakaka as the sponsors and local community said they would not support it.
The Dargaville committee has accepted that the decline in racing would lead to track closures, but the pill they haven’t been able to swallow came when NZTR wrote to the committee to inform them no further racing would be staged at Dargaville with an offer to help sell the racecourse to put the money into other racecourses.
The club has owned the land in an unencumbered title since it was donated to them by a local family named Findlayson about 100 years ago. Since then, volunteer committees have run the racing with all upkeep on the course done through working bees. Not one cent has ever come from NZTR to assist in its maintenance. Some committee members have served for 30 volunteer years, so anyone with a sense of fairness will understand the resistance.
Shane Jones and Winston Peters at odds on the future of Dargaville
The irony of the Dargaville stand-off is the NZ First left hand not knowing what the NZ First right is doing. Almost simultaneously, Winston Peters signed off on the legislation for the ‘land grab,’ as NZ First’s Provincial Growth Fund Manager, Shane Jones, allocated the Dargaville community $900,000 to develop the racecourse for the benefit of the community.
Dargaville is on the point of gaining approval for a retirement village and housing development to benefit the locals, and rightly say the grant or the land value won’t be used to benefit NZTR, and nor it should.
In a letter to Dargaville from Bernard Saundry, dated June 25th, in part he stated: “As a starting position, we would propose that 20% of the proceeds be allocated to support racing in the northern region, 20% be allocated to NZTR for stakes and other purposes, and the balance (60%) settled on a community trust as the Club has previously proposed.
“I must also warn you that NZTR’s patience in relation to this matter is close to exhausted. We wish, as does the Minister, to see an industry-led negotiated resolution to the future of the Dargaville Racecourse. However, if the Club continues to fail to engage reasonably with NZTR by refusing to provide the information NZTR has requested, or to continues to avoid negotiating in good faith with NZTR, or otherwise act in a way which gives rise to concerns about the Club’s governance and management, we will be left with no choice but to consider other options to bring this matter to a close, such as exercising NZTR’s statutory power to dissolve the Club.”
“…analogous to the collectivisation of farmland in 1920s Soviet Russia” – Dargaville committee
The Dargaville Racing Club take this view:
The ‘Transfer of assets and surplus venues’ clause should have no place in New Zealand. It is analogous to the collectivisation of farmland in 1920s Soviet Russia (‘Your land is not yours, it belongs to everybody, and we are going to collectivise it.’)
“The clause is based on a false premise. Assets built up, particularly in rural communities, from donations of land, from volunteer labour, from grants and local fundraising, are community assets. Not Racing Industry assets, and no amount of Trumpian repetitive rhetoric will alter that fact.
“Racing has been held at Dargaville for nearly one hundred years. Never has there ever been mention of the race track being an ‘industry asset.’ It wasn’t an industry asset when the toilets needed replacing; it wasn’t an industry asset when the track rail needed replacing, or the many other capital improvements.
“The original land was donated circa 1925. In all that time no one can remember, and no record can be found of the New Zealand Racing Industry making any contributions to any capital development at Dargaville.
“All built by working bees, donated labour, donated goods…
“Very considerable input from the local community, first in developing the land, then gradually building up the asset we have now. Clubrooms, commentators tower, toilets, cafeteria, stables, jockey rooms, etc. All built by working bees, donated labour, donated goods, and capital grants from outside organisations such as ASB and Lotteries Board.
“It is an impossible leap to go from that level of community input to claiming, retrospectively, that the Dargaville racecourse, is in fact, an industry asset. It just stretches credulity.”
The Dargaville case rests, your honour. Let this be a warning to all clubs owning their own land, racing only once or twice a year – they’re coming to get you.
And to finish, I should reveal that NZTR isn’t happy with me because I used a table in a blog published on June 18th, entitled, “Alarming foal crop projection for 2021 as NZTR administratively expands.”
In that blog, I published a table put together by NZTR (the second table that appears on the prizemoney possibilities) supposedly not meant for my eyes and apparently not meant for publication in The Optimist. I didn’t know that at the time, and it’s only a table I could have composed myself in two or three hours.
But I soon found out the NZTR board, or at least some of them, or perhaps just the absent Chair, was furious and has demanded to know who the whistleblower is. Who supplied the table? I did receive two phone calls making friendly inquiries on behalf of the injured parties but didn’t reveal the source.
Next, I am informed (third hand) that Bernard has sent out an email to over 50 on a database requesting any information as to who leaked the table. What are they going to do to that person if they find out? – disappointing that no reward was offered, and disappointing Bernard didn’t even phone to ask, if he needed to know that badly.
NZTR must have more important things to do than conduct a witch-hunt to find out who leaked the table, especially when it was minor information that was circulated to some clubs by email without a confidentiality stamp.
Well, I can tell you who leaked it, Bernard. It was Bill – a photo of Bill appears in my blog published June 25th.
Appallng situation for Dargaville. Land donated to the community by a local family?improved over the years by local voluntary groups and committees? No maintenance costs contributed by NZTR? What gives NZTR the idea they are entitled to the proceeds?
They are misguided, it belongs to the community who will make good use of it for a whole range of local sports and other groups. Take a leaf out of Westports book for example. Sell it to council for $5.
No racecourse donated by locals can be owned by anyone other than the communities it was donated to. NZTR does not have the powers like Transit to “take” forcibly other peoples property.
On the breeding and racing front, we (the breeders and racing folk) see NZTR bogged down by increasing beaurocracy, huge overhead costs, jobs for the boys etc. we race for pittances, trainers & owners can no longer afford to support all the overheads, so are cutting back. Trainers can no longer work for prestige and (love),no income Small breeders forced into an ever decreasing corner are giving up and cutting back. Big studs are selling & racing in Australia. Several of my friends also race their horses in Australia where their industry is far surpassing ours.
Brian is right, in a couple of years there will be no foals and therefore no horses to race
Actually, yes, NZTR does have the legal right. Enshrined in law thanks to the Act 2020. Never did I ever think we would see such draconian legislation pass, but, thanks to this current lot of politicians, we have a Soviet-style collectivisation model.
But, the writing was on the wall – I personally rang one particular club official to try and get them to see what was likely to happen – and was told to, basically, go away, mind your own business.
Hokitika [ Westland ] was the only one which could see the likely end result, and donated their ground to the local council for community use. They also gave them significant cash so any capital expenditure would not need to be met by ratepayers.
The club did have its day held by the Greymouth people, on their Omoto track, but only once. They have been denied a permit since, to the detriment of the circuit, the other three clubs, and the region.
Well done. As always succinct and to the point. I have been in NZ now for 30 years. It was a really lovely country to breed and race in then. Now it isn’t.
Nothing done properly anymore
No one involved in running racing seems to have any understanding of it at all. The passion , all the small breeders have given up.
Sadly tracks not maintained properly, little to no prizemony , , no winning percentages given to stable staff, the people who work the long hours in all weathers. Just a big mess. ..
Why don’t they give jumping only licences to tracks in danger of obliteration? Could this be made to work and at the same time save the jumps game from that fate? Obvious problems with this but just could be done.
Actually Trump would never go along with any government stealing of land.
Only the low-life Democrats would be in favour of doing that as they haven’t met a socialist or communist that they don’t admire.
Drat! There goes your invitation to NZTR’s Christmas party.
As always, brilliant stuff.
The legislation certainly is draconian but that’s what Labour governments are best at.
The country really sucked a kumara when they gave Winnie the 7% enough to go with the socialists. A very dark year for New Zealand was 2017.
Man oh Man they used the Trumpian thing as an example of saying a lie over and over doesn’t make it fact which is what he did to convince the less intelligent rednecks. They didn’t mean it is something Trump would do. You are right though, he wouldn’t do it on behalf of the govt but he would be in like Flynn if it was for him personally. He’s a greedy crook. And thank goodness for the Democrats for cleaning up the mess made by Trump.
Oh and good on you Dargaville Racing Club. Right wing politician Winston Peters brought this in so he could be guaranteed free feeds for the rest of his life at Ellerslie and Trentham. Probably his only reason for it.
Komrade Saundry will have the Dargaville committee earmarked for the Lake Grasmere salt camps ! Unbelievable outcome. The Act of 2020 has a lot to answer for. Having served on a club committee at a tiny track – Marlborough RC – in the early 1980s, I can tell you that as a wet-behind-the-ears newbie I was more than mildly surprised that NZTR did nothing for facilities at the track. In those days of course we even did our own stewarding.
As Brian points out committees and club members are what has enabled these clubs to survive. The Soviet-style collectivization is sure to earn the NZTR commissars a Red Star from Chairwoman Jacinda
Comrade? Chairman Jacinda? You don’t have to make up legislation as a lefty to steal land. Queen Victoria stole plenty of Maori land. You saying she was commie? Quite the opposite don’t you think. Winston was behind this and he is no left winger. Today’s racing industry is panicking and rather than going back to basics and the grass roots which it will have to do when it does finally collapse, we have the leaders doing the dead opposite and stomping on the grass roots people. It cannot work this way. No grass roots no industry and that’s with all industries and sports. They’re just going to make it happen sooner. The collapse I mean. I actually can’t wait so we can get it back to where it should be about the majority. The flash rich guys in suits won’t want to know about it but the battlers will pick it all up again.
The powers tht be are getting desperate, unfortunately they have no solution but even they can see that they are killing off the sport.
As for Dargaville I would have thought that the land would have to be returned to the family that donated it!! Should it be seized I think there will be a revolt
With a socialist Government at the helm it’s no wonder the powers that be in NZ Racing feel they can asset strip rural areas. They must be stopped in their tracks. Excuse the pun. Beware all other rural clubs. If N Z Racing succeeds in this case, they will do the same everywhere.
As commented earlier, the concern is too late. It was clearly indicated, prior to the time for putting submissions before parliament, what the intentions were under the new racing Act. It is now legal to steal community racecourse property.
All clubs had the time to do something to protect their assets, wherever possible and in whatever form that protection needed to take.
But most sat on their hands thinking, it won’t happen.
It has and it won’t stop at Dargaville.
Horrible & ugly truths. Never was about people or horses, but about the Land. It really was designed to fail…
https://croakingcassandra.com/2020/01/16/decomposing-the-nz-economy-and-australias/
Sandrey and co were looking at doing the same to waterlea race course in blenheim as they are doing to dargaville.we put the course in a charitable trust which they are not happy about.missing out on a possible 18 to20 million.of course we dont have any gallops meeting allocated to us now.
Dargaville and your article are the perfect illustration of what is wrong with racing in NZ and perhaps politics. Ellerslie, Dargaville and any other club only exist because of the racing “industry”. Until the clubs, breeders, owners, trainers and racing public realise we are interdependent the industry is doomed. The churlishness of Dargaville not transferring race dates does nothing for the betterment of racing in the north or elsewhere. Likewise your one-sided article. What about distributions from NZRB? Peters advocacy to close a nonviable and unsafe track was correct and the sort of leadership generally lacking in his reign. The small-mindedness that besets the industry from the top down is the problem. Pam Robson is right. The course has been set and we need open minds, fairness and leadership to find solutions not parochialism or heavy handed administrators. As for Optigate, it is laughable if it were not symptomatic of the ship of fools the industry has become.
It’s not often I disagree with Brian. But I heartily agree with Steve Scott – if we don’t fully act on Messara then NZ Racing is dead in the water especially under current management. Sad isn’t it, and apart from half a dozen big studs and three or four owners there won ‘t be anyone left.
What about jumping going it alone on the defrocked tracks?!
I supported asset transfer legislation because I saw/still see it as the only way to save NZ racing. Sell the Avondale land,YES, but I didn’t envisage the current muppets in charge having a go at the Dargavilles’ of the racing world. Racing does not need small rural clubs land. I agree with Steve Scotts post and am going to quote a couple of abridged paragraphs from my submission to last years select committee by way of explanation. ‘With legislation in place for asset transfer it is imperative the same legislation ensures a subset of the Minister appointed board are responsible for apportioning the funds for track and infrastructure maintenance. Post RITA it is paramount that the decision makers are people who truly understand thoroughbred racing. It is not a money free for all and none of it should be put to stakes. In the mid 2000’s the (then) current Racing Minister was responsible for obtaining funding to increase stakes for elite G1 races. I can recall his very words “use it wisely”. The administrators of that time didn’t. One even crowing ‘we now have the richest derby in the world’. That lasted all of two years. Asset transfer will enable a much fitter racing industry to thrive and stakes will organically follow the upward trend’.
The fix is simple. The board decides which clubs stay and who goes. Those that are out can play the Dargaville/Hokitika card or they can have a regular day or two at ‘another’ club e.g. Marton at Awapuni. The clubs that remain get extensive track and facility maintenance, except Ellerslie, that would be a cut too deep. Also the exception to none of Avondales land sale money not going towards stakes would be Avondale themselves. They would retain 20% which would enable them to develop a super day, or two. You may be left with 28 tracks, possibly up to 36 but importantly there will be close to half a billion dollars available for extensive remedial treatment. To those administrators who prattle on about how everything they have done is down to voluntary work without assistance I respond by asking where did the stakes come from that are the backbone of your raceday? All clubs exist because of generations of punters. This leaves me to conclude by quoting another paragraph from my submission.
‘My final point about governance is a lot of the mess the industry has got itself into is due to too many non-racing people making bad decisions. Yes, there has been mistakes by racing people, mostly driven by ego, minus the love, but overall it is people without skin in the game, without historical knowledge and without any real feel for racing, making too many dumb decisions. Much of the current woefully underperforming structures, have been put in place by non-racing people. Legislation is the foundation then we must ensure we have a top class team of builders”.
A reminder, fellow readers, of history and reserves wastefully spent exceedingly badly.
Approximately 10 years ago, the industry had reserves of $86 million and cash in hand of $10 million. The Racing Board through inexperience of Directors in their board roles, from the chair down, blew the reserves, in which we have gone from bad to worse until we were insolvent as an industry.
When, and only when, you have the skill sets and expertise around the Board table, you will not have a light at the end of the tunnel. Board members disclosed to date are short of that expertise in my opinion.
Therefore, blindly trying to attack low hanging fruit for cash to run a badly managed business only leads to one outcome.
Mr Messara made a specific reference to pt 7 in his report – the outsourcing, or partnering, of the TAB.
That was the most important of all his recommendations, without that, he said, the rest is just window-dressing. It hasn’t been acted upon, it won’t be, so any reference to ‘acting on the M report’ is just irrelevant twaddle.
Couldn’t agree more. When Winston Peters failed to operationalise the MR, instead of just giving it lip service, all bets were off. And John Clydesdale alluded to the most pertinent point about the industry’s money management – ‘wasteful’ If NZTR got hold of Dargaville’s money it would evaporate into the great wasteful abyss in the sky – just as the $100 plus million did about a dozen years ago with NZRB. The MR was a plan; where’s the NZTR plan? BdL
Pam,
I was never hopeful that the Messara Report would be fully implemented – it was never going to suit
a lot of the people running racing in this country. To fully implement the Messara Report would
mean that there would have to be transparency and accountability. This is the last thing that racing authorities want.
In the words of Donald trump, we need to drain the swamp.
Sell Ellerslie =1.5 billion
Put the money into Dargaville.
Problem solved.
If you’re going to grab land .get an expensive piece.
I see things that others can’t