THE decline in the number of trainers’ licences issued in 2017, as published on Tuesday by the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board, is worrying, and it is worrying because it looks like a trend, not a blip.

Ten years ago, there were 805 trainers’ licences in Ireland. Last year there were just 578. That’s a decrease of over 28% in a decade.

More worryingly, the rate of decrease appears to have been accelerated last year. In 2013, there were 673 trainers’ licences issued, 382 full licences and 291 restricted licences. In 2014, there were a total of 640 licences issued, which represented a drop of almost 5%.

In 2015, there were 621, a drop of almost 3%. In 2016 there were 620, which was a respite, a drop of less than 1%, but the 2017 total of 578 represented a drop of over 6.7% on the 2016 figure.

SEVERE

The decrease from 2016 to 2017 was at its most severe in total restricted licences (decrease of 11.7%) and in restricted and full National Hunt only licences (11.9%). The quality of National Hunt racing in Ireland at the top level has never been higher, and that is to be celebrated, but it is from the grass roots that today’s top trainers have grown. The ground at grass roots level in any discipline needs to be fertile in order for that discipline to thrive and flourish, and serious efforts really should be made to arrest this decline.