Sport

For as long as racing has been around, so too has the bookmaker - the person who takes bets. In the very early days, the bookmaker and horse owner were often one and the same.

Modern bookmaking in Jamaica appears to have had its forerunner in the 1940s with Frank Watson's Off Course Betting, which conducted off-track pari-mutuel betting and acted as agent of the racing promoters of the day. A break with the promoting company in 1955 led to the start of independent bookmaking as we have it today.

Still, bookmaking was not an activity that was legally sanctioned and there was a constant adversarial relationship between the bookmakers and racing promoters who opposed their activities. Book-makers were generally perceived as scoundrels and parasites preying upon the racing industry, and their activities as detrimental to the sport.

legalise bookmakers

In the 1960s, representations were made to Sir Alexander Bustamante to legalise book-makers, and my good friend Cecil Charlton, the long-reigning president of the Jamaica Bookmakers Association, recalls that 'The Chief' encouraged bookmakers to band together in an association, to better represent their case.

The Betting, Gaming and Lotteries Act (1965) paved the way for legalised bookmaking. By the beginning of the 1970s, the 20th century horse-racing pioneer, Frank Watson, was joined by other established companies. Track Price Plus and Charles Off Course Betting were already established, to be followed by Ideal Betting, Summit, Cornwall, Post to Post and, much later, Folly's Betting in 1993.

Today, the racing industry in general, and bookmakers in particular, seem to be caught in a time warp. Old structures and outdated thinking persist, even though the rapidly changing gaming industry, new tech-nologies and new thinkers dictate a strong imperative for fundamental change in racing and in the relationship between bookmakers, promoters and regulators of the sport.

source of revenue

The establishment of the Betting, Gaming and Lotteries Commission in 1975 (BG&LC) was against the background of the need to regulate the escalating activities of the bookmaking industry and to find a way to channel funds back to the racing industry. At that time, more than 80 per cent of the sales of the promoting company was being handled by the bookmakers from whom the promoters received no income. A number of schemes were introduced to correct this imbalance and these schemes became an important source of revenue to the racing industry.

The main areas of contribution were the supplementing of purses but there were also major areas of contributions to the breeding industry - foal subsidies, annual yearling sale, production of a stallion register, breeders bonuses, etc. These were covered in Part IV of the BG&LC Act and Section 28 was specific in detailing the areas to be considered for assistance.

Both the Jamaica Racing Commission and the Betting, Gaming and Lotteries Commission shared a common chairman and staff up until 2001 and there was, therefore, greater synergy and understanding of the needs of the racing industry. Following the split and the increased activity of other gaming operations, there has been less attention paid to the racing industry by the BG&LC. Payments under the various schemes were never received on time and the promoting company was forever in an overdraft position in order to satisfy the published contributions from the various schemes.

Mounting interest charges forced the promoting company to negotiate some alternative method of funding. In 2004, the agreement was reached that all purses and breeders bonuses would be paid directly by the promoting company and a new tax structure was introduced to effect this change.

At that time, no one seemed to have appreciated that there were other needs which had to be satisfied and restructured schemes to satisfy these needs had to be put in place. Nothing was ever done. The Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association has been pleading for years to meet and discuss solutions to these increasing problems.

Eventually, after some years of not even being able to get a meeting, one was eventually held a few weeks ago. This meeting achieved nothing other than the reassurance that there is not the mindset to understand the value and importance of the industry. The legal arguments put forward as to the role of the BG&LC and the interpretation of Section 28 was just another way of dismissing the role which the BG&LC should be playing in its advisory role to the minister in establishing schemes from the moneys collected from the bookmakers.

In fact, if there was the slightest understanding of the role and contribution that a vibrant racing industry can make to the social and economic well-being of this country, then they would have appreciated the need for subsidies, not only from the tax collected from the bookmakers but also from the tax collected from other forms of gaming. In fact, the latter is the major source of funding for racing activities all over the world.

What is clear is that the racing industry cannot continue as currently funded. The proliferation of other gaming activities makes it impossible for the industry to support itself solely from the generation of its own revenues, especially in this environment where some 50 per cent of the revenue generated from the expenditure of the promoting company is channelled elsewhere.

Let us start recognising the needs of the industry by reintroducing the levy schemes and giving back some of the money that is generated from the racing industry's own activity. Then let us place a special tax on other forms of gaming which will be specific to the demands of a vibrant industry.

Howard Hamilton is the former chairman of Caymanas Track Limited and is currently president of the Jamaica Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association. He may be contacted at howham @cwjamaica.com.