For months now, the jungle drums have been beating about the probability that Terry Bailey, Racing Victoria’s long-serving Chief Steward, was heading to Singapore. Well, it’s now been confirmed, and Bailey will finish up at RV on July 11 and take a break, before starting as the Chairman of Stewards at the Singapore Turf Club.

Bailey took over as Victoria’s Chief Steward on the retirement of Des Gleeson, and he has been in the job for more than 10 years. So, what is his legacy?

As is the usual thing, this morning’s newspapers carried the expected claptrap from RV’s Chief Executive about Bailey’s departure. You know the kind of thing – the departing individual is usually portrayed as some kind of mix between Batman and Mother Theresa. That’s fair enough, I suppose, but, given the undeniable fact that Terry Bailey will be remembered more for the dramas that occurred under his reign than for the positive influences he exerted, maybe a little less sugar-coating needed to be applied to the departure announcement.

There is no denying that Bailey’s style was autocratic, even divisive at times. When one compares the atmosphere in Victorian racing under Terry Bailey, with that which applied under Des Gleeson, the comparison doesn’t stack up well. In Gleeson’s time, and in Ray Murrihy’s time with Racing NSW for that matter, verbal clashes between senior riders and the Chief Steward just didn’t happen. The need for mutual respect between the Chief Steward and the senior riders was well understood, and well observed. It’s difficult to see the same mutual respect principle having been a feature of Terry Bailey’s reign.

Now, that isn’t to imply that all senior riders are saints. But the days when jockeys were patronised and referred to only by their surname by stewards passed away many years ago, or at least we all thought that had happened. Maybe not. Ask Craig Williams why he felt the need to give Bailey a verbal serve after a race not so long ago. Think about the way the Danny Nikolic saga played out – and they are certainly not the only cases. Think about the difference in the way the Racing Rules have been “policed’ in Victoria, and think about the way the cobalt inquiries were handled. All of it seems to go down the track of the headmaster and the schoolboys, rather than two sections of the racing industry working together harmoniously for the betterment of the whole racing community. And that, in no way, is any kind of a justification for the “baddies”, or their actions. It’s simply a comment on the apparent operating style of stewards under Terry Bailey.

It’s a bit like understanding how the motto for the Los Angeles Police Department – “To Protect and To Serve” – works. It doesn’t need to say “To Protect, To Serve and To Police”. The policing bit is more powerful when it is an integral part of protecting and serving.

Think about why Racing Victoria felt the need to for a change in operating style to fill the role of Executive General Manager – Integrity Services after Dayle Brown’s departure. That position is senior to the Chief Steward. Think about the style of the appointee to that role, Jamie Stier. He is very much in the Murrihy/Gleeson mould, and works co-operatively, not divisively. That’s not to say that he is accommodating to those who break the Rules. He is just a different piece of work.

Then look at the comments by Lloyd Williams in today’s press. Williams has gone into bat for Bailey and lashed Racing Victoria for what he perceives as a failure to adequately support Bailey, a failure that Williams feels had eventually “worn him down”. Sorry Lloyd, I completely understand that you are the most successful owner, or should we say owner/trainer, in Australian racing, but I can’t agree with you on this one. The old saying that people reap what they sow fits here. A divisive Chief Steward promotes division, and maybe that doesn’t attract the kind of support that might otherwise be forthcoming.

So, where does that leave us?

Quite clearly, this is an opportunity to re-invent the way that integrity in racing is managed in Victoria. I have written previously about the apparent anomalies in penalties handed out to riders and trainers in Victoria when compared with other jurisdictions. It is to be hoped that the new brooms in RV’s Integrity Department recognise that they are dealing with professional people who, for the most part, try to work ethically and responsibly, and build that recognition into their approach to what is also recognised as a complex and sometimes difficult task.

But I can’t help thinking about the Munchkins in the “Wizard Of Oz” marching around singing “Ding dong, the witch is dead”! Maybe Victoria’s riders and trainers are thinking something along those lines as well ……

By Rob Young