The Demand
17. The study states that demand for floodlit AWTs is driven by needs of betting industry. This is by definition a national demand i.e. it can be met anywhere in Britain.
18. The study confirms that for Musselburgh, demand is also “dependent on and limited by the number of trainers and the horse population in Scotland and Northern England, but also in the rest of the UK and Ireland”.
19. Of the 59 racecourses in the UK, 13 are in the BHB Northern Region of England and 5 are in Scotland. There are 20 trainers in Scotland compared to 102 in the Northern Region .
20. There is only a limited capacity within the horseracing and betting industry to grow racing beyond an estimated three to five AWTs. Plans are already well advanced for up to seven AWTs elsewhere in the UK. Newmarket, Newbury, the planned new racecourse at Great Leighs in Essex, Kempton, Redcar, Leicester and Sedgefield.
21. Kempton and Great Leighs (both floodlit) had already gained BHB approval when the Study was prepared. Newbury and Sedgefield have subsequently received BHB approval. Redcar has not yet progressed to BHB approval. Thus four AWTs have already gained approval. This means that Musselburgh is competing for one or at the most two remaining slots. Both Sedgefield and Redcar are in the BHB Northern Region. AWT proposals are further advanced at Sedgefield than at Musselburgh.
22. This all suggests that with 13 racecourses and 102 trainers in the Northern Region, and its proposal further downstream, Sedgefield is a more logical choice than Musselburgh, as its location is nearer to training facilities and it has a potentially larger catchment area of race goers.
23. An additional consideration is that the present arrangements under which the BHB allocate races between courses is under investigation by the Office of Fair Trading and may have to end. If this is the case, then courses will have to compete against each other for races and prize money. There is no evidence that Musselburgh has any unique selling point in relation to the utilisation of an AWT, particularly as demand is national.
24. All these factors taken together suggest that demand may not be sufficiently strong to favour Musselburgh over other competitors with a greater comparative advantage.
|
