The name of former trainer Ben Currie triggers a different response in different people.
In the Queensland setting, there have been few players … certainly none in recent years … who have sparked such volatile and intense debate. Fair to say, the Currie saga, which dealt with a range of charges, courts, appeals and counter appeals, went on far too long to serve any good purpose.
Some would say the ongoing controversy throughout those unhappy years left a pall of disillusionment over certain sectors of the industry over that period of time which, as has been discussed many times, was arguably as much the fault of the inefficient racing judicial system in Queensland as it was any fault of anything Currie did or did not do.
Currie ultimately did serve lengthy suspensions and was also finally exonerated on fraud charges, but, even when he had done his time, the fallout from his previous history continued to plague him with his initial applications for a license to return to a roll in racing being rejected by the relevant authorities reportedly on no less a basis than he was not a fit and proper person to be allowed into the racing fold.
Now, after what is believed to be a negotiated ‘settlement’ between Currie, his team, and the Queensland racing Integrity Commission (QRIC), three months after his application to be a stable-hand was knocked back, Currie has been cleared to work as a stable hand, which he will do for his father, trainer Mark Currie.
It appears that several conditions and strict stipulations have been put in place which, if Currie honours the arrangement to the letter, will allow him a measured return to his former role as a fully-fledged trainer in his own right.
Part of that is a particular timeframe that will be brought into play, namely a period of time in which Currie can first operate as a stable-hand (six months) before he can move on to a stable foreman position where he will again have to complete a timeframe (nine months) before he can formally re-apply for his trainer’s licence … obviously needing the specific tick of approval from QRIC before he can move through to each new stage of his comeback process. That approval is not guaranteed at this time.
Currie’s original ban actually ended in May last year, so it has taken him a further nine months to get any movement out of QRIC.
When his stable-hand application was knocked back in November 2021, while he never gave up on his quest to return to the racing industry, Currie did fear that he might effectively be saddled with a life ban, by default, if nothing changed … and at that time the door had been firmly closed in his face.
Now that door has been opened and he can step through.
Where he heads from here is entirely up to him!
