Supporters of the Slots at Racetrack Program (SARP) are again holding out hope the provincial government will reverse its decision to end the $345 million annual program.
Horse industry employers and employees rallied outside of Queen’s Park on Aug. 30, while a private member’s resolution supporting SARP and the industry was passed in the legislature.
The resolution calls for a review by the Auditor General of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Commission’s new gaming plans. The SARP program was funded by slot revenues.
“While the government has characterized the slots-at-racetracks program as a subsidy to the industry, our PC caucus has expressed the view that the program is in fact a revenue-sharing agreement. It has worked well for years, generating billions for the treasury over those years,” Wellington-Halton Hills MPP Ted Arnott said in a presentation to the legislature on the resolution presented by Nepean-Carleton MPP Lisa MacLeod.
Arnott also pointed to several findings listed in an interim report by the horse racing industry transition panel released last week.
Among the panel’s findings were:
– “Without slots revenue or a new revenue stream, the horse racing industry in Ontario will cease to exist”;
– “Absent some other new revenue stream, no Ontario racetrack has a viable business plan to continue racing operations after March 31, 2013”;
– “The essential ingredients for a viable horse racing industry – tracks, race dates and purses, and products – will dissolve once the slots-at-racetrack program ends”;
– “If the industry closes, the panel has received expert advice that provision should be made for the humane dispatch and disposal of 7,500 to 13,000 horses in early 2013.”
“I hope this motion causes the government to finally wake up and listen to the legitimate concerns that we are raising,” Arnott said. “The horse racing industry is an important employer in rural Ontario and unless the government changes course, thousands of jobs will disappear. It will mean the end of horse racing in Ontario as we know it.”
In his speech to the legislature, Arnott said the decision to end the program came “without warning, without consultation and, we now know, without a proper economic impact study.”
“It is estimated that today the equine industry supports the employment of as many as 60,000 Ontarians, and I’ve been told that the equine industry employs thousands of people in my riding,” Arnott added. “From the beginning, we’ve said that unless the government changes course, the livelihood of many of our neighbours would be in jeopardy.”
In its announcement to end the program, the government said revenue from slots would go to help cut the $15 billion government deficit and be moved to healthcare and education.
“While I firmly believe that the government must take immediate steps to get its spending under control and balance the budget, I have never accepted that this should include eliminating the horse racing industry in the province of Ontario,” Arnott said.
All party support
The MPP said support for the resolution came from MPPs from all three parties.
“It demonstrates the legislature agrees with the idea,” Arnott said of the verbal vote taken on the resolution. “There’s a lot of support for the horse racing industry in the legislature.”
Dr. Ted Clarke, general manager of Grand River Raceway, said organizers were satisfied with the turnout at the rally and the passing of the resolution.
“It was refreshing to have the Conservatives and NDP standing side by side for the industry.”
The transition panel is expected to release its final report at the end of this month.
“I think the transition panel has been given a new mandate to carry on with its deliberations,” Clarke said of the growing verbal opposition to the government’s decision to end the program.
Arnott said he is also waiting for the panel’s final report and to see whether the government will move the resolution forward.
The panel is made up of former Ontario cabinet ministers Elmer Buchanan, John Snobelen and John Wilkinson.
The decision not to renew the program falls in stark contrast to a poll conducted of Ontario residents that finds support for SARP. The Abascus Data poll found 41 per cent of those polled opposed the cutback, while 43 per cent were indifferent and 17 per cent supported the government’s decision.
