breakaway cable

That seems odd.  Yes, longer cables are available, but there is a European Standard for the provision of the eye and it should be close to the base of the towball..

We have a Range Rover Sport with a fixed tow bar and have been advised to fix the cable to one of the holes on the back plate that the tow ball is attached to. This brings it in line with what Navigateur has said.

thanks for your replies, I have a detachable tow ball which makes the tow bar a long way from the towball

Though not on  RR, I also have a detachable bar on my car (Merc R Class ) and the break away easily reaches the loop on the towbar 

from the centre of the tow ball to eye is 12 inches

I have included a photo

If it doesn't reach can you loop it round the tow ball or is this illegal?  Mine reaches the eye on the detachable ok (Outlander) - seems odd that a towbar etc should not be ok for a breakaway I think I would ask whoever fitted it?    I had a breakaway fail and that is scary so they do need to be right - I was extremely lucky no serious damage was done to any of the passers by etc etc.  The caravan jumped onto the opposite verge and stopped on its own. 

Just seen your picture - that looks like a very long way to the ball.  I don't detach mine as I am scared to re-attach wrongly!  But mine doesn't stick out that far.  

Whilst I don't have a RR (I have a Hyundai Santa Fe) my detachable towbar is mounted further under the car than what is shown in your pic. The socket that the detachable part fits into is right under the rear sill of the car, as opposed to sitting behind it as in the pic.

as others have said, the cable is exactly the right length to reach the eye.

It certainly doesn't look like any genuine LR  one I've seen. My neighbour has a Disco 4 and his detachable doesn't extend as much as that nor my Son's factory fitted one on his FL2.

Standard cable is 1 meter long ?

The tow bar is original LR so I might have to ask my LR dealer

how to get over this problem