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The Tote

May I congratulate the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Central on securing this most timely and important debate? Racing is certainly at a crossroads, particularly with regard to funding. I agree with his points on Europe and will return to that issue in a few minutes. I should point out that I have the honour of representing the Cheltenham race course, although I also value the contributions made by smaller race courses. My involvement in racing is at the lowest level, at the point-to-point and hunter chase level, but I want to point out that the Tote is extremely important to the Cheltenham race course and the surrounding area in my constituency. The festival each March brings millions of pounds into the area, much of it from Ireland. An important point is that the Tote Cheltenham gold cup—now called the Totesport Cheltenham gold cup—has been running for many years and is one of the world's leading steeplechases, if not the greatest. The Tote also provides a great deal of prize money and sponsorship for many other races, not only at Cheltenham, but throughout the country. The Tote's contribution to racing, excluding its levy payments, was £11.3 million last year. If we include the levy payments, its contribution was £20 million last year. The most up-to-date figures are being laid before Parliament today. I do not know what they are, but my guess is that they will show a considerable improvement on what is already a good record for the Tote's contribution to racing. The Tote is the largest commercial sponsor of racing by a considerable margin: it sponsored 442 races last year and delivered 42 per cent. of the total prize money on offer through the sport. While we often hear that racing is the sport of kings, it is important to point out that the reality is different. Although royalty are involved in racing and make a welcome contribution, on many occasions the money for a race is as little as £2,000. Given the cost of looking after horses, particularly with the current cost of feeding and transportation, prize money is important. The Tote also provides many other services. There are many betting shops, services on race courses and special low-cost bets that are attractive. The Tote is a national institution, so if it were lost, not only would racing lose out financially, but the racegoers would suffer. As has been said, the Tote was set up 80 years ago to benefit racing. As has also been pointed out, no Government have ever put any money into racing, so the taxpayer is not due any money from a sale or transfer of the Tote. When the then Home Secretary, the present Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor, originally announced his intention to transfer or sell the Tote, a figure of £50 million was mentioned. Some people, myself included, said that that was too much and that the taxpayer was due no return at all for the Tote because no taxpayer ever put any money into it. The original decision to transfer or sell the Tote was welcomed, but no one could have envisaged that it would take so long to get from there to where we are now, wherever that might be. During a debate on 21 November 2007, after Europe stepped into the debate—I shall return to that point later—I called for the Government to allow an extra two or three months at least for the Tote to come to terms with the European judgment and look at its future options. Those two or three months were granted by the Government, but that is a short delay for coming to terms with the situation. It is a rather different situation from the 10-year delay that we have experienced.