Now that I've thought about it a bit more, I tend to agree with a lot of what TS and XPT said. While I think that Confectioner & Sir Dex definitely deserve to be there on form, their trainers and owners knew what the situation was all along, so I guess that's just the way it goes.

I personally think the answer's pretty obvious. Keep the conditions exactly as they are now, but simply give an exemption to the winners of more feature leadup races during the carnival. And also remove the discretionary powers, so that everything is in black and white and everyone knows exactly where they stand.