LAST week’s edition of this paper brought with it news of the establishment of the Irish Thoroughbred Welfare Council whose purpose will be to advise the board of Irish racing’s ruling body, Horse Racing Ireland, on various equine welfare matters.
The creation of this welfare body came hot on the heels of the publication of a report from Britain’s Horse Welfare Board last week which outlined the benefits of a unified and coordinated approach surrounding welfare.
Over the course of the last 12 months racing authorities around the world have had confront various controversies, with issues in America and Australia being two such instances that spring to mind. Meanwhile, closer to home the Irish greyhound industry has had to grapple with the major fallout from the RTÉ Investigates programme.
Thus the creation of a welfare council in Ireland is to be welcomed but what is vital is the role this council will fulfil as horse racing has to be more vigilant than it has ever been when it comes to issues of perception and welfare. Given how much society has changed over the last quarter of a century any failure on the part of racing to live up to its social licence will be detrimental to the long-term health of the sport.
Social standards
At last week’s Asian Racing Conference in South Africa the chairman of the International Federation of Horseracing Authorities Louis Romanet remarked that: “It is critical that we remain diligent, constantly revising and justifying historical cultures. Any failure to meet those social standards, whether real or perceived, could have dire consequences on the long-term sustainability and viability of our entire industry.”
Romanet added that the pressing nature of equine welfare is that is not only the morally correct thing to do but societal expectations are such that racing must be seen to do everything within its control to protect the wellbeing of horses.
All this is stating the obvious as the welfare of racing’s participants is paramount both during and long after careers on the track have drawn to a close. However, what is central to everything is that a clear programme or policy regarding welfare is in place long before any controversies raise their head and that these policies are enforced.
As per the fallout arising from the RTÉ programme on the greyhound industry it is of scant use or consolation to announce a series of reforms in the wake of a breaking controversy.
Rather a set of regulations and a clearly defined framework that is already in place will give the industry a sure footing on which to confront any issues that might arise. This is the challenge that confronts the thoroughbred industry.
Proactive approach
The Thoroughbred Welfare Council is due to hold its first meeting later this month and it would be of great benefit if this body provided racing’s governing body with a proactive and innovative approach to welfare. After all Romanet’s address in South Africa featured the rather prescient observation that: “It is not an unfair statement to say that the future of our industry in many ways on how we collectively react to challenges.”
The challenges that he refers to are those that are likely to provoke an adverse reaction from a society of which a very large portion will have just a passing interest in the sport. However, lessons from earlier this year demonstrate racing must be prepared for such a reaction.
At present the Irish Thoroughbred Welfare Council’s role is seen as advisory, but given the level of expertise on the eight member panel perhaps it is worth considering whether this body should be allowed to do more than simply advise. After all welfare, above all else, is the most pressing issue that is confronting racing around the globe.
ON Wednesday week the entries for the latest edition of the €500,000 BoyleSports Irish Grand National will close and no doubt National Hunt racing’s superpowers are sure to be well represented for the latest staging of the great race.
Last summer two other hugely valuable races, the Galway Plate and the Galway Hurdle, afforded contestants the chance to guarantee their place in the line-ups for those races with victory in several of ‘win and you’re in’ races. These races afforded horses – provided they were in the handicap proper – a chance to earn a place in the starting line-up for two of the richest races in the calendar that might otherwise have been out of reach.
A similar system has previously worked for events like the Breeders’ Cup and the Irish Derby and the time has come to trial something similar for the richest race in the Irish National Hunt calendar. Just 11 days after the Irish Grand National closes, Downpatrick will play host to the latest running of its Ulster Grand National and the backing of Randox means that this race will offer the extremely notable prize fund of €50,000. It seems unlikely that the winner of this race will make it into the line-up for the Irish Grand National and these are exactly the sort of races that should be part of a win and you’re in system.
Similarly, it would seem as though three of the first four home in the Grand National Trial at Punchestown earlier this month will struggle to make the final field for the Easter Monday spectacular.
The Punchestown race and the one at Downpatrick are exactly the sort of races that should be helping to form the field for the Irish Grand National and it could surely only benefit the race by offering a few guaranteed starting places for winning a selection of win and you’re in races. It might help to provide a meaningful narrative towards the race as well as offering a tangible prospect of a starting place in the final field for some of the smaller yards in the country.