‘Orwellian’: Racing NSW under fire over culture and conduct

Racing NSW has been accused of acting as a “lawless organisation” with no accountability as it faces claims it tried to identify whistleblowers who provided evidence against it to a parliamentary inquiry.

The powerful racing regulator and commercial operator headed by Peter V’landys will be the subject of a rare probe by Macquarie Street’s privileges committee after being referred to it on Wednesday for a possible contempt of parliament.

Racing NSW chief executive Peter V’landys has dismissed allegations made against the organisation as untested and an attempt to smear him.Credit: Getty Images

The Minns government tried to block the move in the Legislative Council but it was passed with support from the opposition and crossbenchers.

At issue is whether an August 12 letter from Racing NSW chief operating officer Graeme Hinton to the upper house committee on the proposal to sell Rosehill Racecourse constituted wrongful interference.

Independent MLC Mark Latham said August 12 correspondence, which has not been released, had sought to identify and disparage people who had made claims about a toxic culture at Racing NSW and was “an attempt to intimidate whistleblowers”.

“I tell you one thing at Rosehill on Saturday. I won’t be relying on any tips from Racing NSW because they got it totally wrong,” he said. “They tried to identify two whistleblowers and got it completely wrong.”

He added “the parliament needs to understand we are dealing with an Orwellian organisation” that now saw itself as “more powerful and more important than the parliament that created it”.

V’landys has rejected the allegations as “complete rubbish”, accusing Latham of trying to smear him on behalf of breeders who oppose him and the Rosehill plan, and by taking submissions from “undesirables”.

The parliamentary hearing into Rosehill was called to examine the merits of the racecourse being sold by the Australian Turf Club to create 25,000 homes.

But Racing NSW also found itself under scrutiny over its workplace environment and allegations of an industry climate in which participants who don’t fall into line are threatened with reprisal.

Latham has described Racing NSW itself as being “plagued by intimidation, favouritism, electronic surveillance and constant decision-making interference by the CEO” while also accusing V’landys of regulatory abuse and a lack of financial accountability.

He said on Wednesday the 10-member, multi-party committee had heard from people across racing, “from vets, from former stewards, from people who worked there, from people who knew their finances” and they had recounted “absolutely disgraceful horror stories”.

Mark Latham has taken the racing regulator to task.Credit: Janie Barrett

Contesting the referral to the privileges committee, Environment Minister Penny Sharpe, Labor’s leader in the upper house, said the Rosehill inquiry had strayed well outside its terms of reference and was now “swaying into a very large conspiratorial case”.

Greens MLC and Rosehill committee member Cate Faehrmann labelled Labor’s stance “gobsmacking”, saying it showed “just how nervous the opposition and government are about taking Racing NSW on”.

“These are issues that witnesses have brought to us as a committee. The behaviour of Racing NSW and its CEO is coming up time and time and time again,” she said.

“I don’t usually agree with what [Latham] says but what he said about Racing NSW is spot on.”

Animal Justice Party MLC Emma Hurst, the Rosehill committee’s deputy chair, said it had received a “plethora of evidence” about Racing NSW.

“I’ve reached the conclusion that those within Racing NSW believe they are a lawless organisation that have no accountability to the NSW government or anyone else,” she said.

V’landys said he was confident the privileges committee would find Racing NSW had no case to answer.

“These are all allegations made that have not been tested. There’s no procedural fairness to us,” V’landys told the Herald on Wednesday.

“Latham has made many allegations which have been proven to be completely wrong and fabricated.

“The Greens and Animal Justice Party have got an ideological difference with us. They don’t like horse racing. That’s fine, but what they’re doing by repeating complete fabrication is wrong. They are relying on hearsay and rumours and trying to make them out as fact.”

Racing NSW chair Saranne Cooke told the Rosehill inquiry this month her board was fully briefed on submissions made by the organisation and approved of them.

The board includes Tony Shepherd, the former chairman of the AFL’s Greater Western Sydney Giants and a former boss of Transfield, and former racing ministers George Souris and Kevin Greene.

The NSW upper house does not have power to impose penalties for contempt of parliament.

But a special report by the Rosehill committee about Racing NSW said a finding of attempted interference with inquiry participants “would be a matter of utmost seriousness”.

Investigations into possible contempt of parliament have occurred infrequently on Macquarie Street, with less than a handful of matters typically coming before the privileges committee during a four-year term.

In most instances, it has determined no offence occurred.