With a strong background in sport, The Jockey Club’s Tom Baker is now offering his experience and focus in support of racing’s increasing community engagement work. 

 
My journey to becoming the Head of Social Impact at BHA began 13 years ago. It was in 2011 that I first attended the Cheltenham Festival, seeing Long Run battle his way to Gold Cup glory and beginning what I hope will be a lifelong love of the sport.  

The following year I joined UK Sport, working with Olympic and Paralympic athletes on their volunteering plans to help inspire the next generation. This culminated in me developing a social impact strategy for Olympic and Paralympic sport, harnessing the ability of athletes, major events and the platform of sport to power positive change. With a clear and simple framework in place we’ve now seen athletes use their platform to power positive change around race, gender stereotypes and disability.  

We’ve seen social impact become integral to any publicly funded major sporting event to be hosted in the UK; and we’ve seen an accelerator programme launched to allow each sport to develop their own sustainability strategy. These are vital changes that will improve the relevance of Olympic and Paralympic sport, supporting the long-term future of a movement that faces similar relevancy challenges to the sport of horseracing. 

My love of racing and belief in the power of sport to change lives combined in 2023 when I took on the role of Head of Social Investment and Public Affairs at The Jockey Club. This gave me the chance to better understand what racing is doing to have a positive impact and has given me a great foundation to help develop a social impact strategy for the racing industry as a whole. The role is funded by the Racing Foundation and I’m really looking forward to working with them, as well as the likes of the two racing schools; the RCA and the team at Racing Together to develop this strategy. My task is, in theory, simple: 

• Understand the work currently taking place within the racing industry that either directly or indirectly has a positive social impact 
• Develop priorities for where the racing industry should focus moving forward when it comes to having a positive social impact 
• Propose how the racing industry can effectively structure and resource itself to deliver against these priorities 

I’m really looking forward to this challenge, not least because I know how much great work is already undertaken within the sport. If you have any thoughts, questions or suggestions then please do get in touch, I’d love to hear from you – tbaker@britishhorseracing.com