I was reading somewhere that stated that the TAB pays more than SP 70% of the time on horse 4/1 & more & bookmakers offer better value on the shorter priced commodities.

Those newspaper prices are referred to as
pre-post odds ,not to be confused as SP(official Starting Price) as of the start of an actual race.
They are usefull to get an approx. idea of market order. E.g. if a horse is shown as a $100 price in the pre-post in the newspaper, you can safely bet that it will run like one.
Another amazing statistic is the majority of horses shown in the pre-post market in the newspaper paying $11.00 & less dominate the winners circal.

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Cheers.