Change to trainers’ status

Press, 19 July 1983, Page 28

Change to trainers’ status

PA Wellington An amendment to the Rules of Racing next year could affect the status of many licensed trainers. The amendment will take effect from August 1, 1984, according to the Racecourse Inspectors’ Report, presented to the annual meeting of the New Zealand Racing Conference in Wellington. The Chief racecourse inspector, Mr J. M. Fleming, says that those who are licensed as trainers but also engaged in an outside occupation, will from the beginning of the 1984-85 season be eligible only to hold a Permit to Train or be registered as an owner-trainer unless there are special circumstances.

The report says:— “These restrictions on the issue of licences to train einanated from numerous meetings of a special subcommittee which took place during 1977 and 1978 and which heard submissions from several quarters, including the executive of the New Zealand Trainers’ Association. “One result of those considerations was the introduction of the Permit to Train category. This was designed to distinguish between the ‘full-time’ and ‘part-time’ trainer and to confer on the professional trainer, whose livelihood training represented, additional status.

“It was, therefore, decided that a licensed trainer should, in brief, be a person whose primary occupation was the training of race horses and one who had for a significant period been a, jockey, stable hand or trainer.”