Paul Gadsby - The trainers have had enough!

Quite simply you can not have your cake and eat it.

NHRA have previously declared that grooms are not their problem when other issues have been raised. They can not now decide that suddenly they have jurisdiction over them. What the groom did was wrong, and he has been disciplined correctly and accordingly. This should be the end of the story.

A final thought. This incident happened on a racecourse controlled by Gold Circle. Why have they not received sanction?

Over the Air wrote: Quite simply you can not have your cake and eat it.

NHRA have previously declared that grooms are not their problem when other issues have been raised. They can not now decide that suddenly they have jurisdiction over them. What the groom did was wrong, and he has been disciplined correctly and accordingly. This should be the end of the story.

A final thought. This incident happened on a racecourse controlled by Gold Circle. Why have they not received sanction?

True. Cause if that horse bolted and injured a racegoer, Gold Circle will be held liable. Thats where Public Liability comes into play.

JUST GET THE HORSE TO KICK THE GROOM :woohoo: :woohoo: AND ITS EVEN AFTER THAT :woohoo: THEN PUT THE VIDEO ON YOUTUBE :lol: THEN RIDICULOUSNESS WILL PUT IT ON THE SHOW AND VERY ONE WILL LAUGH AT IT :lol: :lol: CALL IT "HORSE KICKS GROOM AFTER GROOM PINCHES HORSES ASS"

Biggie626 wrote: JUST GET THE HORSE TO KICK THE GROOM :woohoo: :woohoo: AND ITS EVEN AFTER THAT :woohoo:

Then you need to have WCA/COID, Letter of Good Standing

Naresh, the fine should go to GC then..... i don't agree with the liability angle at all. The Trainer has an authority to act and obviously does not condone this behaviour by a staff member. The affected horse actually belongs to owners who should be the aggrieved party in this instance and not the NHA.

To my mind there are two problems here;
1. The groom should have been dismissed however, point 2 could be used in his defence
2. The NHA allows the same horse to be whipped in a race....which action has caused more damage?

Either way the NHA cannot seek to impose a fine when they are unwilling to engage the groom, more importantly their actions will have a negative knock-on effect. Their action in this instance sends a message to all grooms, if you kick a horse at the race track, you will receive a final warning and the trainer will get a R40 000 fine. What a joke, any unhappy employee just has to kick a horse.....not to mention that 5 minutes later a jockey is allowed to whip the same horse.

The action of the groom is a criminal act with a fine or possible jail term attached, the adjudicating party should have also informed the SPCA & SAPS of the action taken by the groom if they were following proper procedure. Maybe the owners should have done so however either way, how is Mr Gadsby supposed to be responsible or liable???

@ Tigershark not condoning what happened but for argument sake,

Its a criminal act as you say. Was the employee informed of the repercussions before employment or when promoted what can happen if animals get abused. Is the procedures in place on how to react when horses behave in certain ways. Is there risk assessments in their workplace if something goes wrong and how to mitigate it.

If this fine does get paid, my view it should go to an equine school for the betterment in the training of people in the equine industry leaning towards the groom.

I have never kicked a horse but if someone kicked a horse i owned and i was made aware of it, he would be fired no matter how sorry he was.

The NHRA has gone quite insane lately so i would boot them into touch if i was Gold Circle.

Phumelela and a few big owners are strangLing anything good that was left of Racing SA.

naresh wrote: @ Tigershark not condoning what happened but for argument sake,

Its a criminal act as you say. Was the employee informed of the repercussions before employment or when promoted what can happen if animals get abused. Is the procedures in place on how to react when horses behave in certain ways. Is there risk assessments in their workplace if something goes wrong and how to mitigate it.

If this fine does get paid, my view it should go to an equine school for the betterment in the training of people in the equine industry leaning towards the groom.

Quite frankly, Racing is on its knees right now. Yes, the big boyz will remain... (no prizes for guessing that).
To me, they (the big boys) can have their cake and eat it themselves too.
This rulong of today, is one of MANY rulings of late, which are diabolical. As much as we were encouraged (duped ?) by the NHRA roadshow, the reality of the situation is that they are NOT making the game any better at all. That is a FACT, IMHO !

Now, all that remains is for myself and many others, to decide whether we stay or go.
I have Trained in my own right, for some 25 years, after having grown up in a racing yard. I thought that I had seen it all. I was wrong.
Maybe it's a new dispensation and my inability to" adapt" , is my weakness, my fault...

The groom who kicked the horse should have been sacked on the spot. There has to be zero tolerance for anybody hurting the animal as the animal cannot defend itself.

The trainer who now has been find the 40k has reason to feel aggrieved as he wont be getting any money out of the groom.

Tomorrow at work if the photo copier does not work quick enough give it a kick, but prior to kicking it make sure people can see you do it. Then see how quick your arse is kicked out of the company.

Training.Development.Mentoring.Procedures.Job description.Disciplinary Procedures clearly spelling out the employers sanctions on unsatisfactory work performance etc. must be in place and communicated to the employee and understood by him or her.....before one can even think of taking action .............I am sure the trainer had all this in place.......

If we look at this logically there is no official training for grooms - The NHRA has allowed this to happen as custodians of the Sport. It can be argued that Trainers and Owners would not want this also(some I have spoken to have told me they would welcome it) as it would impact on their bottom line as they would have to pay grooms according to a paper qualification. So the NRA has no control over grooms yet these people more than trainers vets or Jocks have more physical and emotional contact with horses. It is often the groom that spots something amiss with a horse and alerts the trainer. The NHRA licences starters, identifiers, specimen collectors etc but the people that have the most to do with the animal are not regarded as important enough to licence... I am not saying that an incident of cruelty would not have occurred if the grooms were trained and had to pass a test(oral I would suggest as many of these guys don't have formal education) but at least then there would be an industry code of conduct and standard to work from. I am certain trainers would like to know that the new groom they employed has the necessary acumen to work with horses - Basic early diagnostic skills can often save a horse's life and that knowledge can be taught to grooms formally rather than through on the job training... Another fine mess we find ourseleves in ... just as an aside ..If any South African read the fine of 40k and had no knowledge of the case except that it was a man kicking a horse he would reasonably think that the horse was kicked to within an inch of its life... Just google animal cruelty fines and see how far from the norm this fine is(I am an animal lover but I cannot think this groom or Gadsby deserved a fine of that magnitude in relation to other fines issued by the state for serious abuse that has been documented. I actually wonder if this abuse was reported to the NSPCA as the NHRA surely has a duty to report animal abuse to the state? If it was I wonder if the NSPCA have laid a charge against this groom and when that matter will go to court... I won't hold my breath ...)

I would love to read the NHRA's explanation for this decision and how they came to the 40k sanction.