A $90m land offer could save harness racing. Instead, it is gathering dust
A commercial developer has made the financially crippled sport of harness racing a $90 million land offer.
The problem is, the bid is gathering dust on Racing Minister Anthony Carbines’ desk.
Harness Racing Victoria has been made an offer for land adjacent to Melton Entertainment Park.
“There’s definitely been an offer. I have seen the offer,” president of the Victorian Trainers and Drivers Association Anthony Butt said.
“It’s a lifesaver; a game-changer. We think it would secure our future.”
The $90 million bid is to buy a 30-hectare parcel of land at Harness Racing Victoria’s 93-hectare Melton site on the Western Freeway – significantly more than what the state government has valued the land.
Butt believes an agreed sale would achieve two crucial goals: It would settle the sport’s debt with the state government, and it would allow HRV to retain 63ha of its Melton land to help future-proof the sport. He would not disclose the name of the developer.
The offer was presented to Harness Racing Victoria about five weeks ago and forwarded to the minister’s office three weeks ago. It still remains unanswered.
This masthead reported in August that the state government had asked HRV to sign over its entire 93ha Melton land asset, excluding the track, in exchange for wiping out the sport’s suffocating debt.
This debt included the $42 million HRV had borrowed to buy and build the Melton Entertainment Park complex in 2009, as well as $40 million borrowed from the government to keep the sport afloat.
But Victorian Harness Racing Club treasurer Shane Gloury said the land offer on Carbines’ desk could immediately reverse the sport’s sagging fortunes without giving away their land.
“If HRV were in a position where they could accept that offer, and the government was to permit them, that would put harness racing in a much better position than we are currently in,” Gloury said.
“Basically, it would mean that the debt that is owed to the government by Harness Racing Victoria could be wiped out.
“The government would get all of their money, and it would mean that Harness Racing Victoria would still own a 60ha parcel of land out at Melton worth well in excess of $100m that they could use as a future fund, which the vacant land out there was initially for.
“We think the government is in a really good position where if they really want to help harness racing, they can, and they don’t have to fork out millions of dollars to do it.”
It comes as HRV CEO Matt Isaacs said last week the sport was losing on average $45,000 a race meeting because “prizemoney outstrips direct wagering revenues”.
Melton Entertainment Park (formerly Tabcorp Park)Credit: Wayne Taylor
Two sources speaking anonymously so they could speak freely said they believed the racing minister had parked the land issue until he appointed a new HRV board chairman.
The sources said RSN CEO Bernard Saundry had been linked to the role, and an announcement was expected within weeks.
While Saundry declined to comment, current HRV chairman Adam Kilgour confirmed that he would be stepping down.
He said he agreed at the start of this year to fill the role on a short-term basis to help “make harness racing in Victoria self-sustaining” and not reliant on “constant government handouts”.
“We are still negotiating with the government on compensation for the land,” Kilgour said.
Complicating the land issue is that state government policy, changed in 2019, means that government entities such as HRV cannot sell land without returning proceeds to the government’s consolidated revenue.
The racing minister’s office would not answer specific questions from this masthead about the land.
“We have delivered significant support to ensure HRV remains financially viable because the long-term financial sustainability of the sport is important to the economy and to the overall health of the Victorian racing industry,” a government spokesperson said.
The government said the harness racing industry in Victoria generated more than $613 million annually for the state’s economy and helped sustain more than 4400 full-time jobs – the majority of which are in regional Victoria.
But HRV announced a $24 million loss for the 2024 financial year.
In a bid to pull back millions in savings across the next 12 months, Isaacs announced a new round of industry cuts last week.
The cuts included slashing base-level prizemoney from $4500 to $4000 from January next year and winding back the Vic-bred bonus schemes – in some cases from $12,000 to $5000 for owners of Victorian-bred horses that win their first race.
But key stakeholders claim the cuts were made without proper consultation and will only serve to drive owners and breeders out of the state and out of the sport.
Llowalong Stud manager Kath McIntosh said her family business was not given any warning about impending cuts and, now that the breeding season had started, it was too late.
McIntosh said clients were already cancelling their bookings with Llowalong, which is based in the country Victorian town of Kyabram, and were looking to use stallions in NSW or Queensland.
“If potential owners or breeders can’t get some sort of return on their investment, then they are not going to re-invest,” McIntosh said.
“They (HRV) might achieve their budget by 2026/27, but they won’t have a horse population left.”
Gloury, who is also president of Echuca Harness Racing Club, said the prizemoney cuts should have been made more at the top level and less at the base.
“The stake cuts disproportionately impact and seriously hurt the base of our industry, while the higher end remains less affected,” he said.
“Ultimately, if there are no little fish in the ecosystem, the big fish will also starve.”
Isaacs said prizemoney for the next Hunter Cup would drop from $500,000 to $350,000, while next year’s Victoria Cup and Great Southern Star would be cut from $300,000 to $250,000 as part of $1 million in savings across 46 feature races.
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