Oakbank Racing Club committee under fire over decision to stop jumps racing at Easter carnival

Oakbank Racing Club’s committee has been described as “tin pot despots” as a legal battle over its decision to stop jumps racing heats up.

Oakbank Racing Club chairwoman Arabella Branson (left) with Frances Nelson QC, a life member who has launched a legal challenge. Picture: Brad Fleet

Frances Nelson has spent the best part of five decades grilling people in courtrooms.

When she has not been practising the law as one of the state’s longest serving barristers, Ms Nelson has been chairing meetings of the state’s parole board or state and national bodies controlling thoroughbred horse racing.

The veteran QC’s other passion, though, has been the Oakbank Racing Club, several kilometres from her home at Woodside in the Adelaide Hills.

As a jumps racing enthusiast who has not missed its Easter carnival for 31 years, Ms Nelson is furious with a recent decision by the club to stop holding jumps racing.

Such is her anger, the Oakbank Racing Club life member has launched a legal challenge against the decision which has pitched her against its chairman, solicitor Arabella Branson.

As part of the case, Ms Nelson has made a rare appearance as a witness in a bid to obtain club records which she claims will prove Ms Branson’s committee had no authority to make the decision.

Under cross-examination from the club’s lawyer, Brendon Roberts QC, Ms Nelson said she had grave fears for the future of Oakbank Racing Club if events such the von Doussa Steeplechase and Great Eastern Steeplechase did not continue.

“I know a good many people who only come to Oakbank for the jumps spectacles,” she said.

“They are not going to come to relatively insignificant flat races. Trainers with good horses don’t like them going down the hill.”

Oakbank Racing Club chairwoman Arabella Branson leaves the District Court. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Emma Brasier

Ms Nelson said since the decision to stop jumps racing at Oakbank became public last month she had been inundated by people complaining about the decision.

“My phone hasn’t stopped,” she said. “I have lost count of how many people have been ringing me from across the state and from interstate, especially from Victoria.

“I know of local businesses who are most concerned, especially at Hahndorf where accommodation is booked out every Easter by people coming for Oakbank.”

Ms Nelson said an independent report commissioned by Thoroughbred Racing SA, which she chaired before it became RacingSA, had estimated the Easter carnival at Oakbank contributed $11m to $13m to the local economy.

Ms Nelson’s legal challenge is centred on her belief that Racing SA allegedly told Ms Branson government funding for Oakbank would be withdrawn if it did not stop jumps racing.

Ms Nelson also believes the committee illegally rejected dozens of new membership applications so it could reject a request for a special general meeting.

A form signed by 50 members was submitted calling for the meeting, with 43 signatures refused because the club said they were invalid.

Another request was lodged but the committee refused to sign up new members, including applications from people who had been attending Oakbank meetings for decades.

Racing at Oakbank. Picture: Rising Sun Photography

To support her claims, Ms Nelson is seeking records of recent committee meetings, internal correspondence and the club’s register of members.

Ms Nelson’s lawyer, Dick Whitington QC, told District Court Judge Karen Thomas that, under the club’s constitution, each membership had to be individually vetted by the committee, which had not happened for at least 10 years.

Instead, they had been approved by the club’s staff, including those for Ms Branson and other committee members.

“The real issue is whether the members of the committee are truly members of the club and if they are not, then they can’t be members of the committee,” he said.

“This is a committee which has been acting like tin pot despots trying to build a moat around their little fiefdom.”

Giving evidence this week, Ms Branson confirmed she had received calls from RacingSA telling her that it had decided the time had come for jumps racing at Oakbank to end.

“We had discussions about the program for next season and what it would like without jumps racing,” she told Judge Thomas.

“The club was not in a position to reverse RacingSA’s decision. We met as a committee and there was an unanimous decision to support it.

“There was genuine concern that there would be no racing at all at Oakbank in the future, full stop, if we did not consent to having no jumps racing.”

Judge Thomas reserved her decision.