Race-fixing scandal hits at worst possible time
Harness racing has survived a number of scandals over the years, but the latest race-fixing bombshell threatens to cripple the industry at a time when it is already on its knees.
The milkshaking debacle of the 1990s was damaging enough, when unscrupulous trainers dosed their horses with bicarbonate to make them keep running. The Blue Magic drug disgrace in 2004 which saw the disqualification of leading trainer Mark Purdon, among others, also drove to the very heart of the code’s integrity.
But police Operation Inca, a 17-month investigation which saw multiple charges of alleged racefixing laid against some of the code’s pin-up stars this week, is infinitely more serious for an industry which relies on punter confidence.
Knowing horses have been doped is one thing, but telling a punter that he lost his hard-earned on a race that was fixed is quite another.
The racing industry spends $6 million every year funding the Racing Integrity Unit to try to ensure racing is clean.
Just a few days after Racing Minister Winston Peters likened the declining industry to a dead horse, we are told that some might indeed have been running dead.
Forget the associated drugs charges laid yesterday – every industry has substance abusers – the real issue here is just how widespread is cheating on the track?
We can only speculate on just what the National Organised Crime Group has uncovered in the last 17 months, but its email and text searches must be persuasive.
The unprecedented raids this week scanned three provinces and included trainers, drivers and punters, suggesting it has some evidence of collusion.
What are we dealing with? It must be more than a trainer instructing a driver to give his horse a quiet run, then passing that on to a punter mate. That kind of thing, while illegal under the rules if done for financial gain, goes on all the time.
There are lots of reasons why horses are run cold on occasions – trainers don’t want them having gutbusting runs fresh-up from spells, or back from injury, or they’re aiming to peak their charge for a richer race at their next start.
It is also common practice for punters to get wind of drivers’ plans on how they intend to pilot their horses and bet accordingly. For example, drivers who might otherwise cut each other’s throats agree pre-race that one will take a trail.
I’ve watched a race at Manawatu involving three of those people charged which I believe might be under the microscope, and while the driver hands up the lead a lap from home to the favourite, which goes on and wins, there’s nothing untoward that would draw the attention of raceday stipendiary stewards, who closely monitor race tactics.
But if police have evidence on tape that the driver agreed pre-race to help the favourite, that would elevate it to another level.
So too would any evidence the RIU might have from its betting analyst employed to check into unusual bets or big collects made on the punt.
Four years ago I wrote a feature for the Sunday Star-Times on big Christchurch punter Graham Beirne, the man whose Fendalton mansion was raided by police on Tuesday.
He was one of a number of people complaining at the time their betting had been restricted by the TAB because they were too successful.
I’ve sat in Beirne’s study and listened to him calling his trainer mates for the ‘good oil’, an edge that few dollar-each-way bettors enjoy.
Knowing which horses a trainer is letting loose and fancies on their work is not a crime. It’s called doing homework. Beirne will volunteer himself the punt has not been so lucrative for him in the last couple of years. The whole industry is now waiting to find out just how the punt will go for them in the months and perhaps years to come.