Do you remember July 27th? That was the day that The United Kingdom prepared itself for the Olympics, the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport showed off his bell-ringing prowess, and everyone got ready for a fortnight of good news, Well, almost everybody. On that day the people of the historic cathedral city of Hereford received news that the owners and operators of the city's racecourse, Northern Racing and Arena Leisure, were to cease operating at the racecourse, on the grounds that the course was making a loss and, with only 17 years left on the lease and no chance of an extension offered by the council, investment was not an option.
Horseracing in the city of Hereford has been taking place since 1771 and there are a lot of local owners, trainers and jockeys. As a local resident, and fan of open spaces and horseracing, I was immediately up in arms and set up a petition to save the racecourse, that now has over 1500 signatures. I know that not everyone agrees with horseracing, but in a rural county like mine it serves as a local industry as well as a leisure activity.
Wednesday 8th August saw a public meeting in Hereford which aimed to discuss the future of the city's racecourse. One issue that immediately came to light was that the Reuben Brothers, owners of the newly enlarged Northern and Arena, stated in the Racing Post on 8th May that they intended to be "good custodians" and that they "stressed that they had no intention to close any of their venues".
The meeting in Hereford was attended by council leaders, councillors, Jesse Norman, Member of Parliament for Hereford and South Herefordshire, and around 200 members of the community, both that of the city and the racing fraternity in this 'equine county' as one attendee referred to Herefordshire. For once, and probably a good thing in the face of so important an issue as the closure of the course, there was total agreement and unanimity as to where the source of anger and frustration lay, and that was squarely at the door of Northern Racing and Arena Leisure, as an extended lease had apparently been on the table as part of a rent review since the beginning of 2012.
Considerable derision was in evidence for the assertion that Hereford Racecourse was unviable, as the assembled gathering felt that this had been, to some degree at least, brought about by the removal of two of Hereford's most lucrative fixtures, on Boxing Day and Grand National Day, to other racecourses in the Northern Racing group, as well as the preponderance of midweek fixtures, which meant that fans of racing were unable to attend due to work commitments.
There is to be a meeting between the leader of Herefordshire Council, Cllr John Jarvis and Northern Racing in early September, which will look at the issue of the lease, but Herefordshire Council is hampered somewhat as, due to the nature of the lease, it cannot enter into negotiations with another potential operator until the next potential date that exists for either party to end the lease agreement, namely the end of 2013.
The possibility of Hereford hosting fixtures in 2013 is looking unlikely at best, and only possible if Northern and Arena renew the lease, but the BHA has indicated that, if an acceptable bid is forthcoming from a fit and proper person, it would be willing to grant fixtures for 2014. A local consortium is ready to make a bid, but cannot do so until Northern Racing and Arena Leisure relinquish the lease.
As things stand at the moment, all we can do is gather as many signatures as possible on the petition, to show the depth of feeling that there is about a company seemingly pulling the plug on a city. There will be meetings in September between Herefordshire Council and Northern and Arena. Due to the timing of the announcement it did not get much national coverage which, I feel at least, it should have done. Maybe with this blog article it will.