Mr. Darragh O'Loughlin:

On behalf of the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board, I thank members for the invitation to appear before the Committee of Public Accounts to discuss our 2022 financial statements, alongside our colleagues from Horse Racing Ireland and the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. I am joined by my colleague Dr. Lynn Hillyer, IHRB's chief veterinary officer.

The IHRB is the independent, internationally recognised racing regulatory body for horse racing across the island of Ireland, an industry that supports more than 30,000 jobs and contributes €2.46 billion to the economy. Under the Horse Racing Ireland Act 2016, the IHRB is solely and independently responsible for making and enforcing the rules of racing, licensing all participants and regulating horse racing, including anti-doping and handicapping. The IHRB provides professional officials and volunteer race day stewards for all race meetings in Ireland to ensure that the rules are properly observed, and the integrity of the sport is maintained. In 2022, the IHRB oversaw a combined 482 race fixtures across the 32 counties in flat, national hunt and point-to-point racing, with 39,825 runners in total. The corresponding figures for 2023 were 38,601 runners across 483 fixtures.

Governance is a key pillar of the IHRB’s strategy for 2024 to 2027, published late last year. The strategy commits us to consistently applying a robust governance framework and rigorous probity regime. The board of the IHRB is made up of eight directors, currently four male and four female. To improve board diversity and independence, the IHRB amended its constitution in 2022 to provide for the appointment of independent directors. Following an extensive recruitment process, two independent directors were appointed at year end and took office at the beginning of 2023.

The IHRB’s horse racing integrity services funding comes via Horse Racing Ireland, HRI, and we meet with them at least quarterly to ensure transparency and oversight of spending under the agreed budget. In mid-2023, a significantly revised and strengthened service level agreement, governing the provision and use of funding for horse racing integrity services was agreed between HRI and the IHRB and we continue to operate within the funding parameters agreed with HRI. Any reallocation of funding must be agreed with HRI and disclosed in the IHRB financial statements, as must severance scheme proposals prior to the circulation of terms to staff or representatives. The IHRB believes that our funding ought to be directed, as far as possible, towards our core functions of integrity, rider safety, equine welfare and licensing. However, other obligations relating to governance and probity must be met. These require significant resourcing to ensure they are delivered and reported to the expected standard. The IHRB is committed to effective joint working with HRI and efficient delivery of shared objectives. To that end, we have put in place a joint IT strategy and are exploring a shared services approach to key support functions such as finance, HR, procurement and compliance. This will realise gains in capacity, effectiveness and resilience, and eliminate key person dependencies.

As the committee will recall, the board became aware on 28 June 2023 of an issue relating to financial governance which had occurred in early 2022. This was immediately disclosed to the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, the Comptroller and Auditor General and Horse Racing Ireland. The issue concerned a transfer of €350,000 which was made in January 2022 from the jockeys emergency fund, a charity bank account administered by the IHRB, to the IHRB’s bank account. This was subsequently reversed in April 2022. The transfer is disclosed in the notes to the financial statements. The professional services firm Mazars was engaged to carry out an independent review of this and other financial governance matters. The review, which involves detailed scrutiny of six years’ worth of financial and other records as well as interviews with relevant individuals, commenced at the end of August 2023 and a final report is expected shortly. Pending receipt of the Mazars report, the auditors examined banking transactions for the financial year 2022 and confirmed that the highlighted transfer of €350,000 was an isolated incident. When the final report is received from Mazars, it is the intention of the directors of the IHRB that the findings will be published and the recommendations will be acted on.

In the meantime, formal agreements are being put in place between the IHRB and the various charitable and non-profit entities for which administrative support is provided, along with written policies and procedures clearly defining roles and responsibilities, strict transaction approval controls and segregation of accounts access. We will also implement any further measures which are identified by Mazars to ensure the necessary governance structures and policies are put in place and financial controls enhanced.

The equine anti-doping programme remains a top priority for the IHRB and, after payroll, is our most significant area of expenditure. Our equine anti-doping strategy continues to evolve and operates on a sophisticated risk and intelligence basis, backed by rigorous processes of investigation and follow-through in the event of an adverse analytical finding. IHRB teams took 5,403 samples from horses in 2022 and 5,866 in 2023. These were analysed at LGC Labs in Newmarket, England, one of only six International Federation of Horseracing Authorities, IFHA, recognised reference laboratories worldwide, and resulted in 11 adverse findings in 2022 and six in 2023. This year, we also launched a joint anti-doping initiative with the British Horseracing Authority, which saw approximately 250 samples, both blood and hair, taken from more than 120 horses across 14 premises in advance of the Cheltenham festival. An independent review of the anti-doping programme by renowned global expert Dr. Craig Suann, published in April 2022, confirmed that the IHRB programme at least matches international best practice, and it made recommendations to enhance it further.

The Suann review recommended that CCTV cameras be installed in the sampling units of each racecourse. The IHRB accepted that recommendation and installed CCTV in sampling units with the roll-out of CCTV across Ireland’s 25 permanent racecourses. The other recommendations are in the process of being implemented, subject to availability of resources.

In October 2022, we established the equine injury in Irish racing risk reduction project to identify, understand and mitigate risk factors for racing-related equine injuries. The aim of the project is to identify and implement measures to reduce the risk of injury to horses in racing.

To enhance transparency, we will shortly begin monthly publication of anti-doping activity on our website, including details of horses which have been the subject of an adverse finding.

I again thank the Chair for the invitation to appear and for the committee's attention this morning. Dr. Hillyer and I are happy to answer any questions members may have.