The Irish trainers association will refuse to support the new overnight declaration of jockeys unless agreement can be reached with the Turf Club on a number issues before the system officially begins on January 1st.

Willie Mullins, the chairman of the Irish Racehorse Trainers Association, said yesterday: "As things stand, we will not take part in it. We are not against the overnight declaration of jockeys, but we feel it has not been discussed enough with us. The Turf Club has presented a booklet on how the system will operate, which contains many old rules we don't agree with, as a fait accompli and we are dissatisfied with that."

Currently, a trainer can declare a rider for his horse up to half-an-hour before the first race, a move that overnight declarations will stop.

"Lots of things can happen in 24 hours and lots of good jockeys can become available. We are looking for certain assurances about what will happen should, for instance, a jockey a trainer wants to ride for him become available on the day of a race. Will he be allowed ride?" Mullins said.

Another complaint from the trainers is a Turf Club instruction which only allows jockeys to be replaced on a "like with like" basis.

"If a trainer wants to replace a senior jockey then he must put another senior rider instead. The same applies with replacing a claimer. Another claimer must be put up. There is no rule which says a trainer cannot put up any jockey he wants, but this instruction means that stewards are telling owners who can and can't ride their horses. We complained about this over a year ago. Nothing happened and no changes have been made to it under the new system," Mullins said.

The trainers association will meet with the Turf Club keeper of the match book, Cahir O'Sullivan, on Friday, and Mullins is confident that a compromise can eventually be ironed out. But he is not so confident that it can be reached by January 1st. "I think there will eventually be a settlement, but time will be a problem," he said.

Cahir O'Sullivan yesterday did not accept that there had been a lack of consultation between the Turf Club and the trainers association. "We had a number of seminars in November to explain the overnight declarations to trainers, and while we were asked for some clarifications, there were very few complaints," O'Sullivan said.