As part of a wide-ranging review into how NH Breeding in Great Britain can best be supported, which led to the decision to introduce the NH Mare Owners’ Prize Scheme (NH MOPS), the Horserace Betting Levy Board (HBLB) has agreed that a single integrated NH Breeders’ Incentive Scheme be introduced from 2016 onwards. This combines the most important elements of the previous NH Breeders’ Prize and NH Elite Mares’ Incentive Schemes.
The most significant change for breeders is that all prizes earned by horses bred by them will take the form of vouchers giving discounted nominations to British stallions suitable for NH production. The majority of vouchers will carry a higher value than would have been earned by the previous Breeders’ Prize Scheme.
However, there will be no cash equivalent and vouchers cannot be traded, so that only active NH breeders will be able to benefit from the new Scheme. Although the TBA regrets that inactive breeders will no longer receive prizes for wins by good horses that they produced in the past, it recognises that the money spent on NH breeders’ incentives comes from the HBLB, which has a duty to ensure that its resources are spent in support of defined objectives.
One of these objectives is ‘the improvement of breeds of horses’, and whilst it is clear that this is supported by awarding vouchers to successful breeders so that they are encouraged to produce future NH racehorses from suitable British stallions, this cannot be the case when there is no knowledge of how prizes are used or that the breeder is even active.
In addition, the costs eliminated by not making payments to those that are no longer active, or who choose to cover their mares abroad, resulted in significant savings to the HBLB that enabled the launch of NH MOPS, which the TBA regards as one of the most important initiatives of recent years to benefit British NH breeding.
Breeders will be awarded vouchers for wins in more important races by horses they have bred, these being: Class 1: £4,000 voucher; Class 2: £3,000 voucher; Class 3: Novice: £2,000 voucher. These awards can be used for any mares owned by the successful breeder (pro-rata for mares owned in partnership).
Said Bryan Mayoh, Chairman of the TBA NH Committee: “I believe that the new HBLB NH Breeders’ Incentive Scheme is the right innovation. It simplifies two schemes aimed at helping British NH breeding into a single coherent scheme more clearly targeted at this purpose. By offering rewards to the breeders of successful British NH horses in the form of vouchers for their mares to visit appropriate British stallions, it ensures that all funds are reinvested in the industry and contribute to the improvement of the Jumps breed in this country.
Declining numbers of NH mares have placed increasing strains on the viability of standing high-class NH stallions in Great Britain. By focussing rewards on British-based stallions the new Scheme provides much-needed support to our NH Stallion Industry. The Scheme also requires reduced funding, since no cash prizes go to inactive breeders; this helped the HBLB introduce NH MOPS. Given reduced levy income there could be no guarantee that we would have been able to keep the previous NH Breeders’ Prize Scheme in any case; and in its stead we now have complementary schemes aimed at creating a brighter future for British NH breeding.”