Mr. Noel Meade:

I will get back to Deputy Heydon on a couple of issues he brought up. He referred to the fixture in Punchestown that was sponsored by the bookmakers but which ran into opposition with the open meeting in Cheltenham and he wondered why it could not be changed. While I am aware the bookmakers think it would be easy simply to race when they wanted to so do, the pattern must be taken into consideration, whether it be on the flat or over jumps. For example, the jumping season's graded races probably start in October and every week thereafter throughout the entire season, a number of graded races are run. They run one into another with the result that one will have the big meeting in Down Royal, which runs two weeks before the meeting in Fairyhouse and so on. Consequently, if one changes one race, such as the John Durkan Memorial Chase or the Morgiana Hurdle race at the particular meeting to which the Deputy referred, by bringing them back or forward by one or two weeks, one would be running them into another race meeting and into another race. This is where the problem with the fixtures comes in. I have no doubt but that the fixtures require a complete overhaul. It requires a blank sheet and to start it again but this cannot be done by stating it will be done in a particular way by next year. Were someone to start the whole thing again with a blank sheet by moving whatever races needed to be moved and were we to move along bit by bit, it would take until 2020.

The Deputy also raised a point on the size of the board. The race horse trainers certainly have no problem with the board being as big as whatever. I have been on the board for two terms, with just one year to go, and I do not believe the board's size ever caused a problem. The board works very well and I would have thought that having everybody represented is what it is all about. I cannot understand why it is proposed to make it smaller or what difference it would make. The board meets every six weeks to give our opinions and the executives take whatever from that. It is a good system that works well and I see no reason whatsoever for it to be made smaller.

In respect of the other point about racing in Dundalk, at present the bookmakers fund winter racing in Dundalk, in conjunction with Dundalk, which works quite well. Were the bookmakers prepared to do that again and to continue, I would say they could race every day of the week. I do not know whether there would be enough horses available to do that but if the money to race in Dundalk is taken out of the general prize fund, it will decimate the prize fund for the regular racing. One will reach a situation where there will be no money for anything. At present, we are struggling and the prize fund is poor and what will then happen, which has happened in England, is that when racing at the all-weather tracks gets down to such a low level, it basically becomes crooked because people are not getting paid for racing and so they find other ways of doing it.