Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

On behalf of the people of Kingsford-Smith, I pay tribute and offer condolences for the life of a great Australian, Bart Cummings. Since 1883, when Randwick Racecourse was established in my community, many in my community have had a great fondness for the sport of kings, and everyone knows the name Bart Cummings. It is synonymous with racing and it has been synonymous with Randwick Racecourse for many years. Bart was drawn to Randwick and moved his operation to Kensington in 1975, establishing Leilani Lodge on High Street. These stables quickly became the centre of success at Randwick and were the home of champions such as Ming Dynasty, Beau Zam, Sky Chase, Campaign King, Dane Ripper and Saintly. It is also at Leilani that he taught his son Anthony, who is an accomplished horse trainer and very respected in our local community, and his grandson James. They both got their start working for Bart. James was appointed Bart's foreman in 2009 at the tender age of 21. It led in 2013 to him and Bart being granted a joint licence to train in partnership.

Bart Cummings was born and raised in Glenelg in South Australia where he spent his life around horses, working as a stablehand for his father James Cummings. It is well known that early in his life Bart was diagnosed with an illness and was advised not to be around horses—because of an allergy. Thankfully he did not take that advice and he went on to become Australia's most successful horse trainer. He experienced his first taste of Melbourne Cup victory in 1950 when he strapped Comic Court for his father. In 1953, at the age of 26, he was granted a trainer's licence and won his first Group 1 race, the South Australian Jockey Club Derby, with Stormy Passage. He then went on to become one of our nation's most prolific trainers and sportspeople. The record is just unbelievable: seven Caulfield Cups, 13 Australian Cups, five Cox Plates, four Golden Slippers, 32 Derbies, 24 Oaks—a total of 268 Group 1 wins. Of course he is most famous for his 12 Melbourne Cups.

I am fortunate to have had many dealings with Bart Cummings. When I first started working as an organiser for the Australian Workers Union, I was appointed to work in the horseracing industry, particularly around Randwick, Rosehill and Warwick Farm racecourses in Sydney—predominantly to improve working conditions for strappers and stablehands, who were working at the time in what was almost Dickensian conditions. Thankfully, the conditions have improved quite a bit since then. So I did have some dealings with Bart Cummings. Every now and then we did have a run-in; we did not see eye to eye on a couple of issues. We did have our arguments. Bart was certainly a very tough negotiator who never gave anything away. But, at the end of the day, when you reached a deal with Bart Cummings, he stood by it. Compared to many other trainers that were training around Randwick at the time, Bart had a number of very loyal and long-term employees who had been with him for many years. If you want a good indicator of how a person treats their employees, look at how long their employees have been with them. Bart certainly had many loyal, long-term employees.

Bart was also of very quick wit and he had a very quick mind. He was famous for a number of sayings. His son, Anthony, said that he taught him everything that he knew; he just never taught him everything that Bart knew! He also said that a good horse would win the race that you train him for. I think that is the best way to sum up Bart Cummings. He had a knack and an ability to pick a horse and to set a horse for a particular distance or for a particular race. His record across the whole spectrum of races—from the sprints and the Golden Slippers, right up to the staying races in the Melbourne Cups—and the fact that he had success across all that range of different racing platforms is testament to that particular saying and his ability to pull that off.

It was wonderful to see on the weekend the Randwick racing community give the king of the 'sport of kings' a fitting send-off. The Cummings family gave the Australian Turf Club special permission to honour the legendary trainer at the Chelmsford Stakes day at Randwick on Saturday, where sections of the lawn in the Theatre of the Horse were painted green and gold in honour of the 12-time Melbourne Cup winner's famous colours. Jockeys wore black armbands and a minute's silence was observed. A special condolence race book was produced, and Cummings' old horse, Precedence, was granted special clearance to lead the Chelmsford Stakes field out as he continues to prepare for his fifth Melbourne Cup start.

Despite living a life surrounded by royalty, luminaries, dignitaries, prime ministers and premiers, by all accounts Bart was a down-to-earth person who treated everyone equally. Delivering his father's eulogy, Anthony said a couple of days ago:

In the end, dad was more than a horseman. An icon, a legend, all of that. Built from flames and hardship to go with success. Bob Hawke described him as a great and good Australian. Enough said.

In 1982 Bart was honoured with the Order of Australia for his contribution to the racing industry; in 1991 he was inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame; and in 2001 he became an inaugural inductee into the Australian Racing Hall of Fame. He passed away two days after he and his wife, Val, celebrated their 61st wedding anniversary—an achievement in itself.

On behalf of the Kingsford Smith community, I offer my condolences to Val, to his children Margaret, Sharon, Anthony and Anne-Marie, and to his entire extended family. May he rest in peace.

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