In racing terms, it was always the short-priced outcome.
The dynamite court case between Racing Victoria’s chief vet Grace Forbes and her employer has been settled out of court.
Forbes famously threw a grenade just before the Spring Carnival, launching bullying claims against RV and mainly its CEO Aaron Morrison.
Despite saying just on Wednesday that she wanted to come back to work, Forbes is now expected to resign her position as part of her settlement. But RV too decided to settle despite Morrison strongly denying all the claims publicly and privately telling people his organisation will be vindicated.
Details of her settlement are confidential, with an RV spokesperson telling Betsy they’ll be making no comment. You’d imagine it won’t be a cheap exercise for RV, but it’ll be relieved the public drama of the battle will now go away.
Betsy has been told terms of the settlement have been agreed to in principle and both parties will head back to court next Friday.
In some ways, it’s a shame the public and participants never got to see both parties go head-to-head. It’s the industry’s money at the end of the day paying for the case and any compensation should Forbes have received it.
But the real reason punters would have benefited from testing Forbes’ claims is mainly to do with whether they were true.
The claims go to the heart of Australia’s most famous race, surrounding new rules which have shaped the future of the Melbourne Cup. Runners have stopped dying, which is an incredible result, but the race is weaker too. The Cup rules still have powerful detractors despite clearly working.
Forbes said Morrison and her boss Jamie Stier “pressured and coerced” her into allowing high-risk international horses to compete in the Melbourne Cup. This is despite RV selling its protocols as world leading and safe.
If, and it’s a big if, the claims are true it would could have potentially cost both men their jobs. RV, for the record, denied the claim.
Forbes claimed this would have allowed horses deemed at “high risk” of catastrophic injury to race in key events such as the Melbourne Cup and Cox Plate. RV strenuously denied the claims.
Morrison post-spring lauded the Cup protocols as having the saved the race. The irony here of course, is that Forbes herself should take a significant credit for the Cup’s recent success.
Forbes also revealed some behind the scenes tensions between RV executives, claiming Morrison’s behaviour toward her shifted after a board presentation on the equine welfare budget in June 2024, where he allegedly shouted at Stier.
Forbes also claimed Morrison made remarks in front of colleagues over a jacket she wore and was denied permission to attend an international welfare committee meeting in Hong Kong.
And herein lies the problem. Forbes, which is her right, caused significant interest in her claims that the governing body bullied her as part of a campaign to make controversial vet rules more lenient.
The fiasco caused reputational damage to Morrison and to a lesser extent Stier.
The implications will stick in the minds of many. Morrison deserved better, if he was indeed innocent as he claims.
But punters and the industry would have been better off knowing whether the claims are true, because of the serious nature.
It’s an unfortunate mess where there are no winners, publicly at least.
