Horse Racing: Departing Leaders in Plea for Newfound Unity

For a few moments yesterday, as Greg Nichols, the departing chief executive of the British Horseracing Board, gave his final speech to a racing audience, it seemed as though this tall, imposing, square-jawed Australian was about to burst into tears. "I'm not normally lost for words," he said, as he started to thank his wife and family for their support during four years at the BHB when the body seemed to stagger from crisis to crisis with barely a pause for breath. Now, with the end in sight, the emotion of it all seemed to be getting the better of him. "Thank you," he said, "for allowing a selfish, indulgent individual to live his dream."

Nichols was speaking at yesterday's 2006 racing review meeting in London, an annual meeting of the clans - or the factions, as the departing chief executive might have it - to consider where racing has been and where it is going. Every acronym in the industry was there, from the ABB, HBLB and HRA to the RCA, ROA and the TBA.

And as both Nichols and Martin Broughton, who succeeded Peter Savill as chairman in the summer of 2004, prepare to leave the BHB, and the Board itself prepares for oblivion at the end of this year, there were mixed messages for the sport. Broughton and Nichols both admitted that racing would now face testing times, with the recent European court ruling on data funding effectively forcing substantial cuts in prize money at a time when there have never been more fixtures or horses in training.

"Current levels still only see owners recouping 28% of their outlay and there is underfunding throughout the sport," admitted Broughton. He denied suggestions from the floor that he would be leaving racing in a perilous position with the sport effectively under control of the bookmakers who will supply funding through the Levy.

"It has always been a symbiotic relationship between racing and bookmakers," he said. "We are unlike any other sport in that racing needs the bookmakers and bookmakers need racing. We need a close and constructive relationship."

The failure of racing's many interest groups to unite for the common good was a persistent source of frustration for Nichols. "Sectional interest prevailed [leading to] racing throwing away a golden opportunity," he told yesterday's meeting, remembering the short-lived Funding Plan which Savill launched several years ago.

The good news for the sport which did emerge yesterday is that racing is now firmly established as second only to football in terms of attendances and expenditure, while it employs, either directly or indirectly, nearly 100,000 people.

These facts were culled from a report on The Economic Impact of British Racing, prepared by the accountants Deloitte and published to coincide with the racing review. The report shows that while total attendance at racecourses dipped below six million last year for the first time sfor four years, this was due to the closure of Ascot. With the "Ascot effect" removed from calculations, attendance was up by about 50,000.

A sobering thought for punters, meanwhile, is that the betting industry's "gross win" on horse racing in 2005 was £1.1bn, of which about £100m was returned to the sport via the Levy.

The Levy system itself now seems to have been guaranteed for the future, as Savill's dream of a commercial alternative fades into history. The BHB too is on the way out, to be replaced by the British Horseracing Authority, a body that is intended to be far less riven by factionalism, from 1 January 2007.

When Savill's plans came to naught, the BHB lost much of its reason to exist. As yesterday's meeting marked the start of its long goodbye, its departing chief executive was the only one close to tears.