Isabel Hurley

THE Equine Council of Northern Ireland is seeking to bring an end to the controversial pre-paid £10 lorry road levy that has resulted in £300 fines being slapped on unsuspecting horsebox drivers from the Republic.

ECNI honorary secretary, David Kirkpatrick, told The Irish Field: “We are in consultation with the Department of Transport in London, seeking a derogation of the road levy on lorries over 12 tonnes used for recreational purposes in Northern Ireland. We believe that Northern Ireland plc will benefit far more from unrestricted movement and the revenue that brings, than the revenue collected by a punitive levy.

The £10 levy, which must be pre-paid before driving a horsebox over 12 tonnes into Northern Ireland, must be paid by law by drivers from the Republic of Ireland. The levy was introduced by the HGV Road User Levy Act 2013 and came into force on April 1st, 2014.

Payment of the levy is recorded in a database using the vehicle registration. Unmarked Driving and Vehicle Agency (DVA) cars are patrolling northern roads and are pulling over any southern-registered trucks of 12 tonnes and over that do not show up on their computers as having pre-paid the levy.

“We want a derogation for anyone involved in sporting activities and when it comes to sporting activities using heavy vehicles, equestrianism seems to be the main one affected by this levy. We wrote to the Department over this, it’s an issue that comes up every day of the week and we are hoping it will be changed,” said Kirkpatrick.

In addition, the ECNI is lobbying the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD) on equine policy and longstanding rates issue as well as equine welfare. The council also expressed dissatisfaction with the lack of tangible progress on the issue of rates relief for registered equestrian breeding establishments.

“We are not terribly happy with the progress of DARD on these issues. DARD lacks an equine policy at a macro level and without that in place, it is very hard to pull anything down to operational level such as welfare. There is a lot of talking and discussion but getting something done is disproportionate. We are also talking to CAFRE and the veterinary community on various issues to try and move forward. We are still battling over the rates issue. We are trying very hard to get things done,” said Kirkpatrick.

It has emerged that equine discussion group funding was not included in the north’s application for European funding.

“We have learned that there is no European funding for the discussion groups in Northern Ireland. We asked DARD to contact Horse Sport Ireland to see how to frame it but have been told that DARD decided not to include it in the application for European funding,” he said.

The ECNI has been involved in the review of the Animal Welfare Act. While the review for farmed animals is in its draft stage, the equine section is still under consideration.

“The ECNI favours an all-Ireland policy on animal health and welfare in this regard. At our most recent meeting at the end of April, we again focused on the role of the ECNI to lobby government on equine issues and agreed an approach to help them to understand the view of the industry for various policy issues that are relevant – in particular the European Directive for a central database of equines and the Horse Racing fund,’’ said Kirkpatrick.