Racing’s ruling body renewed its call for the government to act over the sport’s funding on Thursday at the end of a day in which both racing and betting appeared to entrench their positions in the continuing dispute. While officials at the British Horseracing Authority were pleased to formalise arrangements with the three bookmakers who had already complied with their requirements, there is no sign of another major firm being prepared to sign up in the near future.
Betfair, 32Red and Bet365 were formally named Authorised Betting Partners by the BHA, having been deemed to hold that status when the scheme was announced in October because all three had been making voluntary contributions to the sport from the profits made by their online businesses. Other firms have been reluctant to add to the payments they are required to make to the sport via the levy on betting shop profits.
Under the ABP scheme, those firms who do not sign up to pay a portion of their online profits are now prevented from signing new sponsorship deals with some of Britain’s most high-profile tracks. As a result, some of those in the betting industry have said in recent weeks that the relationship with racing is at its lowest ebb for over a decade, leading to a failure to agree a new levy deal by the October deadline.
After a minister decided on Thursday what the next levy scheme would involve, Nick Rust, the BHA’s chief executive said the government “can now continue its focus on the replacement of the levy with the Horserace Betting Right to which all in British racing remain fully committed”. He welcomed comments made earlier in the Commons by the sports minister, Tracey Crouch, who described the levy as outdated and said: “Work is continuing and more detailed policy design is under way. We will make a further announcement in due course.”
Some bookmakers have expressed outrage about the ABP scheme and threatened to invest their money elsewhere, so the timing appeared significant when Coral revealed its first sponsorship in Ireland on Thursday. The Barking firm will give its name to a major Leopardstown card next month, featuring two €100,000 handicaps.
Spokesmen for the firm insisted the timing was a coincidence although one added: “It just demonstrates there are many different ways to spend your sponsorship and marketing pound”. Another noted that several Irish racetracks had contacted the firm about other openings in the wake of the news.
Asked about the ABP initiative, Coral’s David Stevens said: “Along with five other firms, we made an offer to racing during the levy negotiations which we felt was fair and we were surprised and disappointed when racing turned it down. Nothing has changed since then. We made our offer and await racing’s next move.”
Racing’s next move will be to emphasise the benefits to bookmakers of entering the ABP fold, though, privately, officials say they will certainly not be beating anyone’s door down in a desperate search for new partners. They assert that Betfair and Bet365 are two of the three biggest online markets for horserace betting and that the deals with those operators will return more to the sport than would have been gained if the proposal from the betting side had been accepted during recent negotiations.
The fact that not all racecourses are on board with the ABP scheme threatens to undermine its power and again there is no sign of imminent progress here. The tracks run by the Jockey Club and ARC as well as the five in Scotland have signed up but others like Ascot and Newbury remain aloof more than a month after the initial announcement.
A BHA statement outlined the benefits to bookmakers of achieving ABP status, saying they would have “use of a kitemark and promotional benefits as part of a marketing campaign to be rolled out across the sport. They will also have the opportunity to negotiate preferential commercial arrangements with participating racecourses, including access to sponsorship opportunities, Wi-Fi provision and wider promotion.”
Rust added: “It is vital for the sport and the tens of thousands of people deriving their livelihoods from it that we move our funding from our biggest customer group on to a more sustainable footing, including taking the necessary steps prior to the introduction of the Horserace Betting Right to incentivise digital businesses to make a contribution back to British racing.”
