Redemption on cards at last for Churchill’s baby
After treachery of Tote sell-off, racing has the chance to regain betting control through Britbet
The “Nanny Goat”, or Tote as Winston Churchill named it when he created it in 1928, has become a hugely contentious animal in recent years. To understand the strategic and emotional importance of the pool-betting operation, one needs to appreciate that Churchill’s ambition was to create a nongovernmental body exclusively for the benefit of racing.
In 1961, dark forces facilitated the opening of 10,000 high street betting shops, enabling some bookmakers to pillage and exploit racing. It should have been entirely predictable that they would outmanoeuvre politicians and the racing industry for decades as far as making a fair contribution to the welfare of the sport was concerned.
So, I believe it was an act of treachery and theft when a Conservative government [George Osborne] decided to behave like a greedy child in a sweet shop, nationalising and selling Churchill’s dream, created without any government funds, to a bookmaker in 2011.
Since then, investment in the pool-betting operation does not appear to have been a priority.
However, redemption is now within touching distance, for, in July, the exclusivity of the poolbetting licence falls away and 55 racecourses are launching Britbet, their own pool-betting operation. It is not exactly what Churchill had in mind, because they will be in competition with the existing Totepool, but it is a massive step in his direction.
Racing will at last have a betting operation, which has one motive; to return its profits to the sport.
In a two-way fight with Totepool, there are four reasons to believe that the racecourses’ Britbet will win, if it is managed with ambition and innovation.
First, it will have around five million on-course customers in year one, most of whom will have been Totepool players in the past.
Secondly, the look and feel of their products can be new and modern and there will be no excuse for the technology that they employ not being cutting edge. The same cannot be said of the Totepool, which is going to have to give itself a serious slap round the face with a wet kipper if it wants to thrive.
Thirdly, smart mobile phones give Britbet a real shot at converting on-course occasional punters into regular off-course punters. Because one no longer needs to walk into a betting shop to have a bet if one owns a mobile phone, it follows that if Britbet can sell the message that betting with it preserves the jobs of people who work at the coal face of looking after racehorses, it can capture tribal loyalty.
Fourthly, other international pools will be much happier commingling with a long-term racing-supporting pool than one that is privately owned.
But competition is healthy, right? So, the news that a private equity business is poised to take a 25 per cent stake in the existing Totepool is, we are told, good news for racing and an exciting opportunity. But for whom?
Why would it want to invest its money into such an emotionally toxic operation, knowing that it is going to be perceived as the corporate bad guy?
Well, the answer is pretty obvious to me. It sees this as a good opportunity to make money out of racing, which is the same thing as taking money out of the sport.
There are two things that we can be absolutely certain of; first, it is not a charity, and, secondly, it will have an exit strategy, which involves departing the scene with more money than it arrived with.
So, in the spirit of capitalism, let us hope the element of competition pushes Britbet towards excellence and innovation.
But let us also hope that the right side wins; for the sake of everyone mucking out racehorses this morning.