BHA CEO reveals frustration with laying out potential impact of white paper to government
Julie Harrington bemoans the coming and goings at Whitehall as delays to document have knock-on impact for horseracing
British Horseracing Authority (BHA) CEO Julie Harrington has said explaining to the government about the “unintended consequences” of the white paper into the Gambling Act 2005 review has been “incredibly frustrating”.
In an interview with Racing TV for magazine show Luck On Sunday, Harrington detailed the difficulties the body has faced when discussing the need to protect horseracing ahead of the biggest change to legislation in a generation.
When pushed on how the sport would continue to survive given downturns in funding and the 10% levy on bookmakers profits, Harrington lamented the delay to the publication of the white paper and the revolving doors of Whitehall.
Immediately after taking the role of BHA CEO in January 2021, Harrington said horseracing would require significant funding to have a sustainable future.
The responsibility for the white paper changed hands once again in February after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak split up the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and appointed Lucy Frazer as Secretary of State for the newly formed Department of Culture, Media and Sport.
Former DCMS chief Michelle Donelan was shifted to head up the new Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, leaving the gambling brief with Frazer.
Harrington told presenter Nick Luck: “It is incredibly difficult [in that] the gambling act white paper still hasn’t been published,” she said. “Two years in, I’ve now had six [DCMS] ministers and I think four Secretaries of State. Each time we are doing a huge amount to educate those people in terms of the importance of British racing.”
“[We need] to educate them [the government] about how the funding works. There is this misnomer about prize money where they think that prize money is just for rich people who can already afford racehorses.
“They don’t understand that that’s how money flows through our sport and is distributed. It’s been a constant and regular pace of work to make sure that not only the politicians, but the officials who work within those departments, understand the unintended consequences to racing of anything in the white paper that could be damaging, but also understands the need to ensure that we’re on a level playing field from a levy point of view. And it’s incredibly frustrating.”