MOVING ALONG - IS ESTABLISHING THE BURDEN OF PROOF BECOMING A 'MISSION IMPOSSIBLE' FOR STEWARDS?

By Graham Potter | Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Graham Potter is the managing editor and founder of horseracingonly.com.au. Calling on thirty-one years of international experience as a racing journalist and racing photographer, Graham’s personal blog, ‘Moving Along’ will appear every Wednesday on HRO.

It hasn’t taken Maija Vance long to get into the Queensland way of doing things. When you cop a suspension, appeal the verdict and get the decision reversed!

The young rider, who only recently arrived in Brisbane from New Zealand, duly followed this tried and tested formula when she appealed the decision of the stewards who handed her a six meeting suspension after finding her guilty of careless riding in the seventh race at Doomben on April 4. Her appeal against both the conviction and the penalty was upheld.

That was no great surprise in itself. The form of jockeys finding success at the appeal level is quite staggering given that they had already been found guilty in another ‘court’ where you would suppose all aspects of the evidence had already been thoroughly sifted through and given due consideration.

In the Vance case, the stewards believed that it was not a sudden movement by Vance’s mount Alkiori that caused a ripple effect of interference to other runners, but that ‘Ms Vance allowed her mount to shift in.’

Vance’s defense was that 1) Her horse ducked in; 2) It was beyond her control to prevent it from doing so; and 3) The incident was exaggerated by the erratic behaviour of Bribie (one of the runners affected in the incident) in throwing its head.

The First Level Appeal Committee found that ‘on balance’, whatever that means, ‘it was a sudden movement beyond Ms Vance’s control and she immediately attempted to relieve the pressure.’

In other words their finding was a total contradiction of the stewards’ version of events.

The Committee thus concluded that the charge of careless riding has not been established. It upheld the appeal and ordered the fee is to be refunded to the Appellant.

Now that’s good luck to Maija Vance and those who have gone before her … and that ends the comment on this case in particular, which I have used as the (latest) example of what is arguably a general trend in the outcome of these cases.

That general trend needs greater scrunity …if only to ensure that justice is in fact being served, which after-all is the aim of the exercise … and some hard questions have to asked.

Put quite simply, racing often flounders in quicksand as it tries to gain a foothold from which it can climb and improve its image and if there are doubts about these procedures they should be addressed. All of those involved should come under the interrogation lamp. That includes stewards, jockeys and the various appeals boards themselves.

Firstly, are stewards capable of leveling well thought out, reasonably researched charges which can affect a riders livelihood during the hurly-burly of their already stretched race-day involvement with their myriad of other duties?

Similarly, can a rider effect a fair defense ‘in the moment’ when his or her focus should be on their next ride and their obligation to the owners, trainers and punters who are supporting them?

The bottom-line is that is the cramped time-frame in which these decisions are made is not fair to either party.

Secondly, while there has to be a process of natural justice, is the onus of the burden of proof starting to become a ‘mission impossible’ for stewards?

In the modern world political correctness is playing a part in destroying the fabric of a thriving, free flowing society and it is now finding its way into racing with similar results. Lawyers are lining up to find the loophole for riders to avoid penalties for ‘unproved’ indiscretions and, as has been the case for some time now, jockeys are riding the wave all the way to another legal victory.

Surely it is not a good thing if those charged with policing the sport do not have the necessary power and backing they need to complete the their task.

Nobody wants to see an innocent party found guilty, but if the power to police effectively is slowly allowed to seep away from the stewards, their status will become one of ridicule … which some will argue, it has already reached due to their many losses in ‘court’.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation, surely that cannot be a good thing for racing!

Part of the very fibre of the tough old school jockeys was that when they did things wrong, they copped it sweet on the chin and went on with their lives. None of this ‘wrapped in cotton wool’ stuff of the modern era. They would cringe at the thought!

Thirdly, the appeal’s tribunal, all the way through from the First Level Appeals Board, should take a good hard look at itself.

Even if we allow that all of their decisions are fair (and that would arguably be a bit of a stretch) the time-frame in which they produce some results is totally unacceptable.

The two month delay in the Shane Scriven verdict last year made a mockery of the justice process as the rider made hay while QCAT pondered. He then went on holiday when he was due to go on holiday with the ‘whip-snatch’ incident, a really serious racing violation, a distant memory. Jim Cassidy was allowed a stay in proceedings in one of his cases a couple of years ago and a decision was only produced, by coincidence, after he had completed his Melbourne Cup ride … after which he served a three month sentence.

That sort of delay and the impact it has on racing’s credibility arguably brings racing into disrepute and much as any individual criticizing something like the Cushion Track. Someone was charged for that, yet Appeal Board officials can put the image of racing through the ringer by its inaction with not so much as a reprimand.

The bottom line is that everybody … stewards, jockeys, board officials …must do their job responsibly if natural justice is to be completed at an acceptable level in a suitable timeframe.

In this time of change … let’s also work on getting this one back on track!

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