Newitt slams Racing Victoria stewards after banning son

Fan favourite jockey Craig Newitt has slammed the stewards of Racing Victoria for the banning of his eight-year-old son from entering jockey rooms.

Prior to Race 1 at Sandown on Wednesday, Newitt’s son, who regularly supports the 34-time Group 1 winning hoop inside the jockeys’ room was refused access to those rooms.

Newitt took to social media to call the stewards out for the banning of his son, explaining that his child simply “helps get my gear ready and helps clean my gear” – something which Newitt did for his father, Guy, when he was a child.

Speaking on SEN’s The Run Home, Newitt explained that he is baffled by the decision, especially considering that his son has been helping him at the races since he was five.

“It baffles me, to be honest,” Newitt admitted.

“My young fella, he’s eight-years-old… He deadest lives and breathes racing. He's got a mechanical horse that he rides before and after school every day. He watches races, he does my form for me pretty much.

“Every school holidays, he can't wait to come to the races with me. He gets in there, he gets my gear ready, he scrubs the gear, he helps the other boys out and just interacts with the boys.

“No-one's got an issue whatsoever, but for some reason, they called me in the room, and they said, ‘We know it's school holidays, but your young fella can't be in here.’

“I hadn't even had a ride yet, it was before the first, and I thought, ‘S--t-, I haven't knocked anyone down yet.'

“They said when I go out to ride in a race, he's unsupervised. But there's always someone there supervising him. And also, him being in the jockeys’ room where there's older men getting changed (but) he's been going in the jockeys’ room with me since he was about five-years-old.

The hoop continued by explaining that he would fully understand the situation if his son was misbehaving, but that’s not the case.

Newitt exclaimed that his child is “no longer welcome”, and that decision from the stewards makes no logical sense as the sport is losing the support of the younger generations.

“If he was a kid that was running around, running amok, causing trouble, getting in the way, I could understand that,” the jockey said.

“But he sits there at my locker where I sit, doesn't move, gets the gear ready, and that's it.

“So, he's no longer welcome.

“For a sport that is losing the young generation, it just doesn't make sense to me. I would be surprised if there’s been a rider that hasn’t taken their kids (to the jockeys’ room) at some stage.”

Regarding whether the ban will be a uniform policy across all racetracks, Newitt stated he believes it will.

“It'll be a uniform policy, I would say. The stewards don't just do Sandown, they do everywhere,” explained Newitt.

“The way it came it came across to me was he's not welcome in the jockeys’ room at all.

“We've had knowledge that the stewards weren't approving of it, but I don't even think there's a rule that kids aren’t allowed there.

“Obviously, it's a restricted area where it's basically jockeys only, but, I mean, the jockey's child? I don't know.

“There will just be no kids welcome!

“My boy, he’s devasted. He doesn’t know what to do now because all he wants to do is go to the races. He’s going to have to sit on the front lawn by himself.”