Dr. Andrew Kelly:

I would like to start by thanking the committee for giving the ISPCA the opportunity to present our comments and opinions on the heads of the Greyhound Industry Bill.

As many of the members will be aware, the Irish Society Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is widely recognised as Ireland's national animal welfare organisation. We have been at the forefront of delivering animal welfare services for over 60 years and we are also an umbrella organisation for 19 local SPCAs throughout the country.

The ISPCA is an animal welfare organisation. We are not an animal rights organisation, and it is important to point that out. We recognise that animals are used in a number of ways and our objective is to prevent cruelty but also to promote kindness to animals. We pride ourselves on the fact that our policies are evidence based and ethically sound.

The ISPCA has a team of eight uniformed inspectors, represented here today by Conor Dowling. Currently, those eight inspectors can only cover 17 counties, although eventually we hope to cover the entire country. Our inspectors are authorised officers under the Animal Health and Welfare Act by means of a service agreement with the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine. It is pertinent to point out that there are some exemptions to our authorisation, including that we do not exercise a function under the Animal Health and Welfare Act in respect of a greyhound racing establishment operated by the Irish Greyhound Board or a greyhound breeding establishment within the meaning of the Welfare of Greyhounds Act 2011. Since becoming authorised officers, our inspectors have initiated over 70 prosecutions, 28 of which have been finalised in the courts to date, with eight in 2017 alone.

We have a series of animal welfare policies. The most pertinent one today is that we are concerned about certain sports requiring the breeding of large numbers of animals in order to select the fastest, strongest or fittest, thereby giving rise to a large number of animals that are unwanted or have no value, and essentially are a waste product. The ISPCA believes in engagement, and we do engage with the greyhound industry through the International Greyhound Forum, which consists of represents from the Irish Greyhound Board, the Irish Coursing Club, the Greyhound Board of Great Britain and a number of animal welfare organisations, including our organisation and Dogs Trust, representatives of which we are here with us today.

Our main concerns in terms of welfare within the greyhound industry are for dogs that are injured or that are disposed of inhumanely which, regrettably, does happen. We know a large number of dogs are surrendered to dog pounds for euthanasia once they become valueless. Over a six year period, 3,410 greyhounds were surrendered to pounds. We welcome the reduction over that six year period but that is a lot of dogs. It causes some members of the public considerable distress that dogs are surrendered for euthanasia. We believe that the cost of that should be borne by the industry; I believe the polluter pays principle applies in this regard. The burden to re-home them seems to be passed on to rescue organisations. I point out that 75% of greyhounds surrendered to pounds were euthanised in 2010 compared to 55% in 2015. There has been a reduction, which is welcome, but we still believe it is too many.

It does not help the greyhound industry's case when previous members of the Irish Greyhound Board make comments. For example, on radio recently, when asked if it was considered to be acceptable for large numbers of dogs to be killed as the result of a sport, the person in question replied, "Absolutely I do". That kind of attitude does not go down well with the public and perhaps a culture change is required in that regard.

On the heads of the Bill, the committee has our written submission in which our comments are detailed but I will highlight one or two aspects. We are concerned that there seems to be an apparent move away from criminal sanctions towards administrative sanctions in some cases.

We believe there should be a significant deterrent for people who are determined to commit offences, either internal or criminal offences.

The Greyhound Industry Bill presents opportunities in terms of amendments to the Welfare of Greyhounds Act 2011. For example, we would like to see an amendment to the Welfare of Greyhounds Act that would limit the number of countries to which greyhounds can be exported, the so-called white list. In that regard, we support Dogs Trust and its Bill to introduce that amendment.