Former Victoria premier Jeff Kennett has "savaged the decision to allow jockey Damien Oliver to serve just an eight-month ban for betting on a rival horse" and also said he was wrong to have "privatised the TAB because it allowed the 'cancer' of corporate bookmakers to push the racing industry towards financial catastrophe," according to Bartley & Hogan of the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD. Kennett: "How in God's name this organization allowed Damien Oliver to get off with an eight-month suspension is beyond me. If he had been in Hong Kong he probably would have been jailed." The "outspoken" Kennett forecast a "financial catastrophe for the racing industry, and eventually more sports, under the current betting model." In making "an admission I don't often make," Kennett said that "one of his reforms as Victoria's premier was wrong: to privatise the TAB." Kennett said, "If I had known 20 years ago that in privatising the TAB it would bring an influx of corporate bookmakers to Australia I would not have privatized the TAB. ... They are a cancer in our society ... they're destroying your industry and they're going to destroy most sports" (SMH, 8/18).
