Victorian Racing to become single integrity body for all codes

Victorian Racing has been given a major overhaul in the integrity department as all three codes [thoroughbred, harness, greyhounds] will now be governed by a single independent body.

The Victorian Racing Integrity Unit will establish itself over the next two years in the hopes that integrity in the Victorian Racing sector remains up-to-date and on-par with other integrity units.

Racing Minister Martin Pakula, along with the government, accepted the recommendations put forward by Paul Bittar, former Chief Executive of the British Horseracing Authority and New Zealand Racing.

“This is about giving Victorian racing an integrity model that provides rigorous and impartial oversight of the three codes,” Mr Pakula said in a statement released on Thursday.

The review of the former model was brought about when the live-baiting scandal hit the greyhound industry in 2015. Mr Bittar suggested establishing an independent private company to oversee integrity and Mr Pakula is keen to move forward with the alterations.

“I thank Mr Bittar for his work in conducting the review and each of the controlling bodies for their cooperation and support, and I look forward to seeing the key recommendations implemented within the next two years,” Mr Pakula said.

Racing Victoria and its chairman David Moodie released a statement on Thursday with Moodie stating Racing Victoria “welcomes the opportunity to discuss the report with government”.

“We support the principle of collaboration between the three racing codes and believe that our expertise and processes will be invaluable in helping to inform future discussions with government, HRV [Harness Racing Victoria] and GRV [Greyhound Racing Victoria],” the statement said.

“We also believe in continual development and strengthening of our integrity programs and resources, as maintaining the integrity of Victorian thoroughbred racing is at the core of our existence.”

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Mr Bittar also added that rule and policy-making powers including licensing and animal welfare should remain within the three codes, with the integrity unit to enforce the rules in relation to welfare standards.

In Mr Bittar’s 67-page release, he noted the current issues he has with the Victorian Civil And Administrative Tribunal (VCAT).

Mr Bittar states its system is “not well suited to deal with the particular demands of the racing codes due to the lack of expertise within the VCAT system, issues with the timeliness of hearings and the processes also proving to be much more costly for all parties than originally envisaged.”

It was the length of the Peter Moody cobalt case which subsequently led to his early retirement and Bittar plans to address these problems which are becoming rife in the racing industry. He listed the key advantages to abolishing VCAT from the current model.

(a) Deals with the issue of a lack of expertise to hear cases by removing VCAT from the system;
(b) By removing VCAT, the process won’t be as costly or suffer the delays of the existing system; and
(c) From a participant perspective, these changes enhance the processes and their rights at a RADB level, while protecting their right of appeal of the Supreme Court.

Bittar offered three options in his conclusion and he made a strong case for simply amending the current structures and looking to strengthen the model, but ultimately concluded that the option to retain the current model would likely never deal with the governance issues or genuine cross-code collaboration.

His findings supported the need for a separate integrity body.

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