OPINION
Four Corners sets sights on V’landys as inquiry fallout continues
“You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies,” Oscar Wilde said.
Racing NSW chief executive Peter V’landys has various enemies of various character. Some of them are out in the open while others hide in the shadows, loading the bullets.
Most seem hellbent on bringing the man his allies call “Australia’s most powerful sporting administrator” to heel.
Hearings at an explosive NSW parliamentary inquiry last month into the proposed development of Rosehill Racecourse might have ended — with findings to be tabled in November — but the fallout continues.
The inquiry’s terms of reference were about the controversial plan to level the racecourse to make way for affordable housing for 25,000 residents with a station on the Metro West line.
But it quickly developed into a popcorn-passing war of words between V’landys and independent MP Mark Latham, who has been gunning for the racing boss under the cloak of parliamentary privilege for much of the year.
In calling for V’landys to resign, Latham has accused him of “nepotism, regulatory abuse, and a lack of financial accountability” while also claiming Racing NSW is a “toxic workplace plagued by intimidation, favouritism, electronic surveillance, and constant decision-making and interference by the CEO.”
Questions have been asked many times before about V’landys’ leadership style, whether it’s in racing or rugby league, of which he is ARL Commission chairman, but Latham’s missives are the heaviest blows he’s had to absorb in many a moon.
For his part, V’landys reckons the whole thing is an unedifying hatchet job because he’s sided with Premier Chris Minns over the Rosehill proposal, which could earn the Australian Turf Club
an estimated $5 billion from its sale along with a new racetrack, possibly within the Sydney Olympic Park precinct.
“There is no doubt Mr Latham is running an agenda for some very wealthy breeders who don’t wish to be held to account for animal welfare,”
he told this masthead last month. “They have at all times resisted having their horses traced from birth to retirement. They are attempting a smear campaign on steroids.”
While it’s a very Sydney story, I can tell you Four Corners has V’landys in its sights. Their interest has been the talk of the racing industry in recent weeks after reporter Angus Grigg reached out to several of his, er, enemies.
As the NRL and AFL can attest, Four Corners isn’t the program you want sniffing your jockstrap. It rarely ends well.
You’ll recall ABC stablemate 7.30 aired a damning report in October 2019 about racing’s track record with animal cruelty and wastage.
V’landys insisted in an interview with reporter Caro Meldrum-Hanna that no horse had been sent to a knackery or abattoir “because it’s against the rules of racing.”
The report then detailed how, according to experts, more than 4000 racehorses were being slaughtered in Australia each year. Graphic video footage underlined a grizzly point.
As Crikey’s Michael Bradley
wrote at the time, it was “a classic of the gotcha journalism genre”. V’landys unsuccessfully sued the ABC for defamation in 2021 and lost an appeal in the federal court last year.
V’landys usually welcomes a fight but his decision to support the demolition of the much-loved Rosehill course — the home of the Golden Slipper — has put him offside with many powerful figures, including leading trainer Gai Waterhouse, who has clashed with him many times in the past.
Some of the combatants are once-trusted supporters, including Chris Waller, who has built a racing empire at Rosehill after getting his first boxes there 25 years ago.
When mighty mare Winx was drawing thousands of new fans to the racetrack, V’landys did everything in his power to support Waller, who was under pressure to ensure she kept winning.
Breeding giant John Messara, who races horses in partnership with veteran broadcaster Alan Jones, is also against the Rosehill proposal.
During his time as Racing NSW chairman from 2011 to 2016, he and V’landys were a formidable combination with strong links to government at every level. They did so much for racing, including the redevelopment of Randwick and the birth of The Championships.
So it’s interesting to see them pitted against each other now. Enemies, if you will.
Whether Four Corners cranks up a story in the New Year remains unclear. Grigg had no comment and V’landys wasn’t giving away much when I approached him. He’s aware the program was sniffing around the Rosehill story but nothing more than that.
If I know the pugnacious administrator at all, he’ll want to defend himself against attacks from enemies he can see and those he cannot.
Another Oscar Wilde quote: “True friends stab you in the front.”
Four Corners sets sights on V’landys as inquiry fallout continues
