The last two races at Clonmel were abandoned due to fog© Photo Healy Racing
Precisely identifying when voluntary tips into compulsory is impossible. But if flexibility is presumed within the culture of any industry there often isn't much room for volunteerism. Some work practises have become so ingrained within racing that it can appear flexibility is a one-way street. So in an industry with staff shortages, and a reported reluctance among young people in particular to make it a career, it is surely in racing's interests to make flexibility more of a two-way deal.
Whatever the eventual outcome of Coolmore/Ballydoyle's challenge to a Labour Court ruling that removes agricultural status from racing yards, the industry faces pressing matters in relation to attracting sufficient numbers of talented and committed people to work in it.
Whatever way you define stable staff - and the Labour Court appears to have performed a linguistic feat in managing to argue racing isn't an agricultural pursuit - racing's ultimate self interest is in employing enough of them. And right now it appears a harder sell than ever.
To many within racing there was nothing surprising about hearing evidence in Ballydoyle's appeal hearing of stable staff there working up to 19 hours in a day and up to 28 days in a row. There's always a presumption that working with horses is more of a vocation than a job.
But when those figures hit the headlines amazement was expressed to me more than once from non-racing people that staff were putting in such hours. There were also remarks that if that's the situation in the world's richest and most famous racing yard what must the organisational culture be like elsewhere.
The dream of making it as a jockey still attracts many young people onto racing's shop-floor. In return for pursuing that dream a lot of them are prepared to work long hours at a dangerous and uncomfortable job for relatively little money. But when many fail to beat the odds inherent in that dream they too often leave the industry taking a lot of expertise with them.
It is in nobody's interests to maintain such a drain. Working with horses may be a vocation in some respects but more and more people are voting with their feet when it comes to making a living. The Labour Court verdict on those Workplace Relations Commission inspections at Ballydoyle appears to be a clear signal that it is employers who will have to show more flexibility in future.
By definition everybody wants to pay the least amount for any service. That's the market. But the market is about supply and demand. And if the supply of skilled people prepared to work in racing isn't sufficient then more money and better conditions will be the demand from those who are at least prepared to consider it.
Owners and trainers have to acknowledge they can't depend on old labour presumptions. Certainly the prospect of greater public scrutiny of the conditions employees work under within racing is not something that can be just ignored particularly if employees organise themselves to a greater and more effective extent.
That prospect will be enough to get a lot of free-market merchants hot under the collar with dire predictions about how restrictive and expensive work practises such as operate in France for instance are unrealistic for Ireland.
Except that racing has hardly ground to a halt in France. In fact it seems to be doing rather well under the employment law operating there. The French have adapted. Ireland has to as well.
The practical applications of such adaptation are various. It might include moves such as the division of staff who work at the races and in the yard as is happening more and more in Britain. There are any amount of steps that could be taken. All of them though lead back to someone picking up the tab. And in racing that person is always the owner.
Trainers inevitably argue that increasing training fees is a fraught exercise because owners can simply go elsewhere. And that's always a risk. But a lot of owners and trainers pride themselves on their business credentials and a devotion to the market. It's the whole bottom line bit. And the employment outlook looks a lot like that most reassuring market force - getting what you pay for.
Since Irish racing's financial model basically comes down to faith in the 'trickle down' effect it seems appropriate that attracting staff to the industry might actually mean money trickling down. It looks right now like a lot of futures are tied up in enough of it making it to the shop-floor.
Devine Star disappeared into the fog at Clonmel on Thursday and by the time she eventually got to the start her opposition had gone. It was a regrettable incident that could have been a hell of a lot worse if the mare hadn't been an 80-1 outsider. It was only after the 'Winner All Right' signal that officials found out she hadn't run. If Devine Star had been favourite it would have been a real mess.
Having watched some of the Clonmel action on TV it was hardly a total shock that something like the Devine Star incident happened. On TV coverage large parts of the races might as well have taken place in the dark. You simply couldn't see anything. And it begs an interesting regulatory question - how can you police what you can't see? And if you can't police it, should it even go ahead?
A lot of agendas were tied up in making sure as much of that Clonmel card as possible took place. But there were sizable chunks of races where anything could have gone on and no one - including the stewards - would have been the wiser. Considering the potential scenarios thrown up by such conditions it could be argued an 80-1 outsider overshooting the runway was relatively small beer.
Finally, last week some mileage was got out of a survey in Britain that 52 per cent of the public there think racing is boring. It sounds bad but the context is that 59 per cent think watching golf is boring, which is true, and that cricket, darts and snooker are also more tedious.
No doubt this was fascinating stuff for the PR business. They might even strategise on the basis of it, prioritising who in the 18-35 audience might respond to some targeting. But they will be working off a survey of people either too stupid to put a phone down or too immobile to avoid someone coming at the them with a clipboard. How can anyone base anything substantial on that?
