FOLLOWING extensive consultation between the Victoria Racing Club (VRC), Racing Victoria Limited (RVL) and racing industry stakeholders, it has been decided that emergencies will not be introduced for the Emirates Melbourne Cup in 2010.
VRC Chief Executive Dale Monteith said that the decision was made in the best interests of the racing industry.
“After extensive consultation between industry participants including Victorian Racing Products Victoria Limited and the industry’s Joint Venture partner, Tabcorp, the VRC and RVL have agreed that the benefits to the racing industry of including emergencies in the Emirates Melbourne Cup field are far outweighed by the negative impacts that would result.”
RVL Chief Executive Rob Hines said “although we understand the popular view is to include emergencies we believe that it would introduce additional complexity for our customers that would have a negative impact on wagering on our biggest race.”
The main reasons are:
- We estimate that the inclusion of emergencies would impact pre-race day betting turnover on the Emirates Melbourne Cup by as much as $13.5 million on the Victoria and New South Wales TAB alone - The introduction of emergencies would create issues with interstate and overseas wagering operators, impacting existing and potential new export income
- The potential to introduce ‘bracketed runners’ and ‘reserves’ was investigated, however these would have a negative impact on the wagering turnover of the Emirates Melbourne Cup.
- The introduction of emergencies would cost Victorian racing in excess of $1 million in software upgrade expenses.
- Analysis indicates that there would be no impact to turnover if there are fewer than 24 Emirates Melbourne Cup runners, provided that there are more than 20.
While dialogue will remain open within racing industry stakeholders and pari-mutuel wagering operators, in the immediate term no emergency acceptor facility will be provided for the Emirates Melbourne Cup until the VRC Board and RVL Board are both satisfied that such can be effectively implemented without impacting on wagering customers and both established and emerging markets.
