BHA acting CEO Brant Dunshea accepts Saturday’s twilight fixture at Southwell should have been moved forward to ensure there wasn’t a blank afternoon for ITV Racing, but he stressed the decision not to do so was down to the policy currently in place and the turf venues being optimistic of racing at the time the decision was taken.
Speaking on Tuesday’s Nick Luck Daily Podcast, he said: “There is a published policy for adding extra fixtures during a period of bad weather which has been agreed with racecourses and participation reps.
“In regard to Saturday's, this policy means decisions on adding a meeting are taken the previous Wednesday, three days prior.
"As for moving a twilight or evening fixture to earlier in the day, the decision is taken when the decs are published 48 hours before.
“Once decs have been confirmed and published, we wouldn’t move races earlier due to the potential integrity risk around betting markets and wagering operators not being advised of that.
“What we’re looking at is where we can move times forward without it having implications for wagering operators, primarily overseas.
“With regards to particularly this weekend, when the decision was taken on Wednesday about this Saturday, and this is following consultation with the racecourses, we were very optimistic that at least two and possibly all three of the scheduled jumps fixtures would proceed. Consequently, the team took the decision not to add any new fixture.
"Similarly, on Thursday morning we were still very optimistic that we would be OK hence the all-weather fixture at Southwell was not moved earlier in the day.
"It's really tricky. The team work hard and have an excellent track record of monitoring these things. During this time of year, every day they are monitoring three days out, looking at what do we move, what do we change.
"We have to strike the balance of not leaving us without racing versus adding or moving fixtures unnecessarily."
When asked if the solution wasn’t simply to ensure, from November through to mid-February, that a Saturday afternoon all-weather meeting is scheduled, Dunshea added: "It's an option although it does have its own disadvantages.
"If it's an extra fixture that takes horses away from other fixtures it could impact field sizes and we do need to be really careful in striking that balance, that's the challenge.
"I think if we had our time again and we had a greater insight into what the weather was going to do, then should have moved Southwell’s twilight fixture to earlier in the day and I think we would accept that.
"We do need to be more flexible and are working towards that. We’ve been trialling moving race times forward to test systems and make sure that if we are going to be more flexible and do this in these times of and weather that we are not impacting wagering operators globally and we have that flexibility to do that."
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