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04 Jul 24
16:04
Joined:
Date Joined:
12 Jul 07
Could some kind soul post it please. Five years seems like an eternity. Racing was a much better more joyous place with him in the middle of it.
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Poor article
-----------------------------
After five years without him, we're missing John McCririck now more than ever
author image
Peter Thomas
Senior features writer
John McCririck in the betting ring Newbury 29.12.12 Pic: Edward Whitaker
From the heart: John McCririck fought racing's corner with passion
Credit: Edward Whitaker
Sometimes five minutes with John McCririck could feel like a very long time, particularly when you were on a TV panel with him and he didn't quite see eye to eye with you. There was never anything personal about it, and the end of the show was the end of the argument, but until then it was 'gloves off' and you'd better have done your homework, because he always had.
Friday marks the fifth anniversary of his death, though, and five years seems like an eternity to have been without the great man.
I think it's fair to say that racing – and racing TV – misses him more now than ever; punters, too, because Big Mac, more than any before or since, was the punter's best friend, never slow out of the blocks when a bookmaker needed hunting down and savaging, or when he thought those in the dusty corridors of power were failing in their duty to protect those he insisted funded the industry with their betting.
What he'd have made of affordability checks and the Gambling Commission's embarrassing attempts to manage a situation they can't even begin to grasp, I dread to think. He used to lambast his own kind, the racing press, when he thought they weren't leading the charge robustly enough, so a flabby government lapdog would have been brutally and loudly dispatched.
To say that Mac wasn't everybody's cup of tea would be to understate the case severely, but what nobody could deny was the sincerity of his views and the zeal with which he launched them. He may have been guilty on occasion of being like a dog with a bone, but his agendas were always chosen sincerely; you knew when you saw the rings flashing and the whiskers bristling that his heart was fully in the fight.
The key to McCririck was that while he may have looked like a walking gimmick, he was as genuine as the day was long. I once put it to him that riding a tricycle to his day job at the Sporting Life might be construed as cultivated eccentricity, but he claimed it was a practicality – the trike had saddlebags for all his form books and was handy for whizzing through London traffic – and while the deerstalker hat, the monumental cigars, the jewellery and the rampant sexism ramped things up a shade, there's no denying that he used his unmistakable image to good effect, and always on racing's behalf.
My God, we could use Big Mac now, in our hour of need.
-----------------------------
After five years without him, we're missing John McCririck now more than ever
author image
Peter Thomas
Senior features writer
John McCririck in the betting ring Newbury 29.12.12 Pic: Edward Whitaker
From the heart: John McCririck fought racing's corner with passion
Credit: Edward Whitaker
Sometimes five minutes with John McCririck could feel like a very long time, particularly when you were on a TV panel with him and he didn't quite see eye to eye with you. There was never anything personal about it, and the end of the show was the end of the argument, but until then it was 'gloves off' and you'd better have done your homework, because he always had.
Friday marks the fifth anniversary of his death, though, and five years seems like an eternity to have been without the great man.
I think it's fair to say that racing – and racing TV – misses him more now than ever; punters, too, because Big Mac, more than any before or since, was the punter's best friend, never slow out of the blocks when a bookmaker needed hunting down and savaging, or when he thought those in the dusty corridors of power were failing in their duty to protect those he insisted funded the industry with their betting.
What he'd have made of affordability checks and the Gambling Commission's embarrassing attempts to manage a situation they can't even begin to grasp, I dread to think. He used to lambast his own kind, the racing press, when he thought they weren't leading the charge robustly enough, so a flabby government lapdog would have been brutally and loudly dispatched.
To say that Mac wasn't everybody's cup of tea would be to understate the case severely, but what nobody could deny was the sincerity of his views and the zeal with which he launched them. He may have been guilty on occasion of being like a dog with a bone, but his agendas were always chosen sincerely; you knew when you saw the rings flashing and the whiskers bristling that his heart was fully in the fight.
The key to McCririck was that while he may have looked like a walking gimmick, he was as genuine as the day was long. I once put it to him that riding a tricycle to his day job at the Sporting Life might be construed as cultivated eccentricity, but he claimed it was a practicality – the trike had saddlebags for all his form books and was handy for whizzing through London traffic – and while the deerstalker hat, the monumental cigars, the jewellery and the rampant sexism ramped things up a shade, there's no denying that he used his unmistakable image to good effect, and always on racing's behalf.
My God, we could use Big Mac now, in our hour of need.
https://www.thefreelibrary.com/THE+GREAT+TOTE+SWINDLE%3B+We+reveal+how+the+Tote+shortchanged+winning...-a0145710577
IN THE summer of 1978, Tote Bookmakers were concerned about a successful punter who regularly placed multiple Tote forecast bets shortly before the relevant races started. In the days before computerisation, there was not enough time to include his bets in the racecourse pool, so the punter was paid out at Tote dividends unaffected by his own bets.
A junior employee of Tote Bookmakers reached an agreement with Jeff Wells, the managing director of Tote Credit, that this punter's bets, and similar ones, would be transferred to Tote Credit for later transmission into the pool - after the race had started, and sometimes after it had finished.
Two years later, the then Home Secretary, William Whitelaw, was informed: "Not all the bets were transmitted, but all bets which included winning money were transmitted. The effect of this was to reduce the dividends on each occasion."
Whitelaw's informant was Francis Aglionby, a Crown Court judge appointed the previous year to investigate the Tote's procedures for including off-course bets in on-course pools. A summary of Aglionby's findings was published in 1980, but his full report remained confidential. Under the 30-year rule, it was not due to be released until 2010.
The Racing Post has now seen the full report.
Aglionby's inquiry originated in John McCririck's exposure of the manipulation of a Tote dual forecast dividend at Carlisle on July 4, 1979. McCririck was then an award-winning investigative journalist with The Sporting Life.
When Shine On, at 11-1, beat Tina's Gold, at 20-1, in an 18-runner handicap, and the Tote dual forecast paid a derisory 45p for a 10p stake, McCririck refused to accept the Tote's assertion that it was "just one of those inexplicable turn-ups".
An anonymous telephone caller told McCririck that the reason the dividend was so small was that a pounds 50 dual forecast on the winning combination had been sent by Tote Credit to Carlisle after the race. It was not the only occasion on which bets were transmitted after the result of the race was known.
Bruce George, Labour MP for Walsall South, joined The Sporting Life in calling for the resignation of Woodrow Wyatt, the Tote's blustering chairman. When Sir Timothy Kitson and Bob Mellish, chairman and vice-chairman of the All-Party Racing and Bloodstock Committee, urged the Home Secretary to act, Wyatt withdrew his opposition to an inquiry, and Aglionby began his investigation.
His report reveals that there had been complaints about the procedures for transmitting off-course bets into on-course pools since at least 1968 and that, as early as 1963, "transmission of bets to the course after the result of the race was known was approved". AGLIONBY concluded that the procedures in force between September 1, 1977, when Tote Credit Limited was established, and July 17, 1979, when the practice of transmitting bets after the result was known was prohibited, were unfair and open to abuse.
"Unfortunately," he reported, "abuses and malpractices did occur, resulting in loss to the public, because on occasions punters did have their winnings improperly reduced."
When dividends - calculated but yet to be declared - looked particularly high, "revisions occurred from time to time, always resulting in a substantial downward movement of the dividend".
When other bookmakers wanted to place hedging bets into Tote pools, the bets were collated by the Tote but were not transmitted to the racecourse until after the result was known. Aglionby reported: "I found that, from time to time, not all these trade bets were transmitted. All the winning bets were transmitted but not all the losing ones."
That was the case on April 7, 1979, when off-course trade bets totalling pounds 60 on Lake City, the winner of the 2,000 Guineas Trial at Salisbury, were transmitted and included in the win pool, but pounds 51 of losing bets were not.
In the same race, revised 'reads' - informing the racecourse of off-course bets to be included in the pool - resulted in a reduction in the dual forecast dividend, from pounds 62.86 to pounds 5.77.
In June 1979, a senior supervisor in the racing room at Tote House invented a fictitious name and, after the race results were known, transmitted hedging bets under the invented name. On one occasion the effect was to reduce a dual forecast dividend from pounds 5.68 to pounds 4.99.
In the case of the Carlisle race, the intention had been to transmit pounds 5 on the winning combination, a decision that Aglionby described as "unjustified". In error, a pounds 50 winning bet was placed in the pool, as a result of which the dividend was reduced from pounds 13.41 to 45p.
The malpractices were not systematic. According to Aglionby, "these various abuses and malpractices were not the consequence of any arrangement by employees of the Tote for their own financial advantage", but were motivated by "misplaced enthusiasm". Staff acted to help the Tote's finances, rather than their own. Aglionby found that neither Wyatt nor the Tote's senior management team were aware of the abuses. There was one exception. Aglionby firmly rejected Wells's claim that he was ignorant of the malpractices. The managing director of Tote Credit resigned.
IN THE summer of 1978, Tote Bookmakers were concerned about a successful punter who regularly placed multiple Tote forecast bets shortly before the relevant races started. In the days before computerisation, there was not enough time to include his bets in the racecourse pool, so the punter was paid out at Tote dividends unaffected by his own bets.
A junior employee of Tote Bookmakers reached an agreement with Jeff Wells, the managing director of Tote Credit, that this punter's bets, and similar ones, would be transferred to Tote Credit for later transmission into the pool - after the race had started, and sometimes after it had finished.
Two years later, the then Home Secretary, William Whitelaw, was informed: "Not all the bets were transmitted, but all bets which included winning money were transmitted. The effect of this was to reduce the dividends on each occasion."
Whitelaw's informant was Francis Aglionby, a Crown Court judge appointed the previous year to investigate the Tote's procedures for including off-course bets in on-course pools. A summary of Aglionby's findings was published in 1980, but his full report remained confidential. Under the 30-year rule, it was not due to be released until 2010.
The Racing Post has now seen the full report.
Aglionby's inquiry originated in John McCririck's exposure of the manipulation of a Tote dual forecast dividend at Carlisle on July 4, 1979. McCririck was then an award-winning investigative journalist with The Sporting Life.
When Shine On, at 11-1, beat Tina's Gold, at 20-1, in an 18-runner handicap, and the Tote dual forecast paid a derisory 45p for a 10p stake, McCririck refused to accept the Tote's assertion that it was "just one of those inexplicable turn-ups".
An anonymous telephone caller told McCririck that the reason the dividend was so small was that a pounds 50 dual forecast on the winning combination had been sent by Tote Credit to Carlisle after the race. It was not the only occasion on which bets were transmitted after the result of the race was known.
Bruce George, Labour MP for Walsall South, joined The Sporting Life in calling for the resignation of Woodrow Wyatt, the Tote's blustering chairman. When Sir Timothy Kitson and Bob Mellish, chairman and vice-chairman of the All-Party Racing and Bloodstock Committee, urged the Home Secretary to act, Wyatt withdrew his opposition to an inquiry, and Aglionby began his investigation.
His report reveals that there had been complaints about the procedures for transmitting off-course bets into on-course pools since at least 1968 and that, as early as 1963, "transmission of bets to the course after the result of the race was known was approved". AGLIONBY concluded that the procedures in force between September 1, 1977, when Tote Credit Limited was established, and July 17, 1979, when the practice of transmitting bets after the result was known was prohibited, were unfair and open to abuse.
"Unfortunately," he reported, "abuses and malpractices did occur, resulting in loss to the public, because on occasions punters did have their winnings improperly reduced."
When dividends - calculated but yet to be declared - looked particularly high, "revisions occurred from time to time, always resulting in a substantial downward movement of the dividend".
When other bookmakers wanted to place hedging bets into Tote pools, the bets were collated by the Tote but were not transmitted to the racecourse until after the result was known. Aglionby reported: "I found that, from time to time, not all these trade bets were transmitted. All the winning bets were transmitted but not all the losing ones."
That was the case on April 7, 1979, when off-course trade bets totalling pounds 60 on Lake City, the winner of the 2,000 Guineas Trial at Salisbury, were transmitted and included in the win pool, but pounds 51 of losing bets were not.
In the same race, revised 'reads' - informing the racecourse of off-course bets to be included in the pool - resulted in a reduction in the dual forecast dividend, from pounds 62.86 to pounds 5.77.
In June 1979, a senior supervisor in the racing room at Tote House invented a fictitious name and, after the race results were known, transmitted hedging bets under the invented name. On one occasion the effect was to reduce a dual forecast dividend from pounds 5.68 to pounds 4.99.
In the case of the Carlisle race, the intention had been to transmit pounds 5 on the winning combination, a decision that Aglionby described as "unjustified". In error, a pounds 50 winning bet was placed in the pool, as a result of which the dividend was reduced from pounds 13.41 to 45p.
The malpractices were not systematic. According to Aglionby, "these various abuses and malpractices were not the consequence of any arrangement by employees of the Tote for their own financial advantage", but were motivated by "misplaced enthusiasm". Staff acted to help the Tote's finances, rather than their own. Aglionby found that neither Wyatt nor the Tote's senior management team were aware of the abuses. There was one exception. Aglionby firmly rejected Wells's claim that he was ignorant of the malpractices. The managing director of Tote Credit resigned.
He castigated Tony Blair at Robin Cooke's funeral for not bothering to show up Prob my fave Big Mac moment.
And Blair the rodent (imo) went to the memorial for Ken Bigley….
John might have been a good journalist but he was the rudest person that I have ever seen employed by any TV company. I always changed channels or muted the TV when his face appeared.
Met him once when he opened a local bookies and he was great.....really nice to me
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