20/08/2025
Well written Open Letter to the New Zealand Racing Establishment
By Antony Knowler
This industry is being strangled by boards, bureaucrats, and blazers who cost a fortune and deliver nothing. Owners, trainers, breeders, and punters are footing the bill so administrators can keep their cushy seats warm. Enough.
Here are the facts:
• $13 million wasted on “Racing Integrity.”
• $14 million blown on NZ Thoroughbred Racing.
• That’s $27 million a year — $11,000 a race.
• 4,300 starters last year at $6,279 per horse.
That money isn’t going into prize money, better tracks, or promotion of the sport. It’s vanishing into meetings, reports, and salaries.
The TAB board? Just another layer of highly paid suits clipping the ticket. No transparency. No accountability. Another trough for insiders while grassroots participants struggle to stay afloat.
A nine-raceday card burns about $100,000 in governance costs before the first horse even walks into the birdcage. A hundred grand gone to administration before the product even exists. It’s waste, pure and simple.
And let’s name it: NZTR’s board — Cameron George, Sir Peter Vela, and the rest of you — this is on your watch.
Costs balloon. Stakes stagnate. Participants drown. Where’s the leadership? Where’s the courage to clean house? Or is it easier to nod through another round of “business as usual” while pocketing the fees?
“Integrity” is the most abused word in this industry. Real integrity would mean cutting the fat, ending duplication, and getting money back to the people who actually put horses on the track. Instead, the current model exists to protect jobs, not the sport.
Here’s what must happen now:
• Cut the boards: NZTR reduced to five members max, term limits enforced, seats openly contested.
• One lean integrity unit: No overlapping empires. Independent, efficient, accountable.
• Full salary disclosure: Every director, every executive, every consultant — published. No more hiding.
• Hard cap on admin costs: NZTR + RIU + TAB together capped at 5% of turnover. No excuses.
• Redirect savings to stakes: Every dollar stripped from bureaucracy must go straight into prize money and grassroots infrastructure.
• Performance contracts only: Miss targets, you’re out. No golden handshakes. No endless extensions.
• Independent reviews every 3 years: By international experts, not insiders marking their own homework.
This isn’t complicated. Slash the boards. Cut the wastage. Put the money where it matters. If you don’t, you’ll go down as the people who killed New Zealand racing — not through lack of passion, but through suffocating it under layers of board papers and inflated salaries.
The industry is bleeding out while you polish your chairs in Wellington. Enough. The people who actually run horses, ride them, and pay the bills are done waiting. Change — or get out of the way.
