Withdrawal of Bill surprise to racing board CEO

CHRISTCHURCH: The Racing Amendment Bill, better known as the race fields legislation, has been withdrawn from Parliament.

Racing Minister Winston Peters confirmed the move yesterday at the annual New Zealand Harness Racing Conference in Auckland.

‘‘The Bill before Parliament was withdrawn yesterday,’’ he said in response to a question on its progress.

‘‘The Bill wasn’t fit for type; it wasn’t going to address the real issues the racing industry needs addressing,’’ Peters said.

‘‘There’s no use trying to do a halfpie job with a piece of legislation that wouldn’t have done the job properly.’’

The Bill sought to amend the Racing Act 2003 in order to improve the competitiveness of the New Zealand Racing Board’s betting operations.

The move would not have come as any great surprise to harness racing administrators as Peters had already alluded to the move when unveiling the Messara Report in Hamilton on August 30.

But New Zealand Racing Board chief executive John Allen, who was present at the meeting, seemed blindsided by the news.

‘‘It is a surprise and a disappoint ment. We’ve been waiting now for a year for that. That legislation has been in front of Parliament for that period of time.

‘‘And while I understood the minister’s enthusiasm to do a whole

lot of other things, I simply can’t understand why that legislation hasn’t progressed to being passed and put in place. It would benefit us by about a million dollars a month.

‘‘It’s a surprise, it’s a disappoint ment, and I don’t doubt Shaun Brooks here, our CFO, is now thinking about our targets for this year because obviously we are not going to see any race fields money for this period.’’

Allen had just spoken passionately, almost defiantly, in defence of the board’s direction. Peters had criticised its results on August 30.

In a statement, National’s racing spokesman, Ian McKelvie, chastised Peters for the move and said his party was disappointed.

‘‘It [the Bill] would have had considerable financial benefit to New Zealand’s racing industry.’’

It had taken several years to develop and had the support of the ‘‘whole industry and was set to provide a multimilliondollar injection into the racing and sporting codes, which would have flowed through to race stakes’’.

‘‘The Bill would have enabled the industry to receive approximately $1 million per month in extra revenue. This extra revenue has already been delayed since late last year as the minister initially postponed the Bill.

‘‘Now Mr Peters is making the industry wait even longer for that potential income.’’ — NZ Harness News

❛ There’s no use trying to do a halfpie job with a piece of legislation that wouldn’t have done the job properly Racing Minister Winston Peters