Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy; I am privileged.

I thank all the Deputies who contributed. There have been many good contributions on the Bill and a series of different suggestions, supportive comments and some new approaches, some of which I will address. I will not be able to address everything in the time available to me, but we will be able to tease out many issues on Committee Stage.

A number of Deputies raised concerns about ministerial appointees to the Horse Racing Ireland board. We are essentially moving from the Minister being able to appoint the chairperson, but nobody else, while the industry appointed other people as representatives of different parts of the industry, to now having three ministerial appointments to the board, albeit one of them will represent interests from Northern Ireland in terms of horse racing. That recommendation came from Indecon.

Ultimately, a large amount of public money goes into the industry. It is the correct decision and I hope we will be able to continue to increase funding for the industry and sport, but because of that it is important that we have members on the board, appointed by the Minister, who represent the public interest. There is an onus on the Minister to make sure that the right people are appointed. The new procedures and approaches for public sector appointments will be used. In other words, the skill set that is needed to ensure that we have a balanced board will very much shape the people chosen to be members of the board.

A number of very valid points were made regarding an injured jockeys fund. My experience of jockeys in the industry has been extraordinarily positive. They are courageous athletes who set standards but, unfortunately, at times it is a dangerous sport. Some very serious accidents have happened over the past five or six years. The industry has a responsibility to ensure that such people are supported, and that starts with financial support. There have been many generous fund-raisers in that regard, but I am open to considering ways in which the industry could more formally support the maintenance and pooling of resources to create a fund that could support injured jockeys.

Drug testing is a red line issue for me. We need to have the best drug testing facilities in the world in order to maintain integrity in the sector.

We need to take a totally uncompromising approach towards rooting out the inappropriate use of drugs and illegal drugs. To be fair, we have been doing this through the Department's inspections and the Turf Club's role in protecting the integrity of the sport. These provide pretty robust controls in this area. The Irish industry has a strong reputation and for good reason. We cannot allow anything to undermine this. The independence of the Turf Club and its role in this regard, as well as the role played by the Department and An Garda Síochána, when appropriate, are all focused on ensuring this is and remains the case.

The essence of some of the concerns of a number of Deputies speaking on Second Stage was the maintenance of the independence of the racing regulatory body, namely, the Turf Club, and the Irish National Hunt Steeplechase Committee. The legislation solidifies the independence of the regulatory body. It is about ensuring there is legal separation between Horse Racing Ireland, HRI, and the Turf Club in terms of their clear roles as set down in legislation. We will not go down the route the UK has chosen to take. We want a well funded, independent, well run, efficient and transparently run Turf Club and we have a really good starting point. The Turf Club does an excellent job. It relies on many volunteer stewards in racecourses throughout the country. People have a lot of faith in it. We will not do anything to upset this. What we are trying to do is to build a modern legal structure to protect and add to what is already there and working. That is all we are trying to do.

The Indecon report recommended that I do a lot more than I am doing, in truth. When it looked at streamlining, it recommended that the Turf Club and HRI would be in the same building, and that the Turf Club would move a half a mile or so from where it is into the HRI building. This was its recommendation. It also made a clear recommendation on having a single portal for all payments, whether for licensing or registrations, and that we would have a single office to manage the money coming in and going out, so we would have clear transparency in terms of who pays what and where the money goes. We will implement this element. I made a concession to the Turf Club because I was convinced by its arguments that it was important that it have, and be seen to have, physical independence from HRI in terms of its own building and offices to run its own show. We made this significant concession early on. It was the right thing to do, but it was also evidence that we are doing nothing to damage or undermine the independence of the Turf Club. It is quite the opposite, as this is about protecting it in legislation.

When it comes to funding streams, we must ensure that any body that is publicly funded or partially publicly funded is protected with appropriate modern legislation. This year, the Turf Club, as an independent body, will receive €7.1 million of taxpayers' money to run integrity services in racing, and we must ensure there is legislation to protect it if it is questioned on where the money goes, how it is spent and how the budget is put together. This is why having a single office for managing the money coming in - for example, for the registration of hunters - is simply a sensible streamlining process whereby money comes in through one office. After the Bill is implemented, all of the money that goes to the Turf Club at present will automatically go back to the Turf Club, and we will put very clear language in place and, if necessary, will make appropriate amendments to ensure this is the case. This is not about taking money from anybody; it is about ensuring that any money raised is raised in a transparent way and the budget needed to provide adequate integrity services through the Turf Club is an appropriate budget, in view of all of the different budgetary factors that the Turf Club manages. That is all it is about.

Deputy Penrose and a number of others seem to suggest this is some kind of takeover from voluntary hunt clubs of the scheduling and operation of point-to-points. Nothing could be further from the truth, as all of this will remain within the infrastructure and with the people who are there at present. The beauty of point-to-points is that they are run by amateurs. Of course we have a Turf Club presence at meets, and we also have HRI funding, as it spent more than €1 million this year supporting integrity services for point-to-points, but ultimately the scheduling of point-to-point racing and the operation and running of point-to-point racing will remain with hunt clubs and will remain with the Irish National Hunt Steeplechase Committee in terms of its operations. The only thing that will change, essentially, is the registration fee to register a hunter, as this will come through the new streamlined office which will manage the process. It is about the process, and not about changing influence, decision making or the people who run the show. Point-to-point racing is in the legislation because nobody can credibly say point-to-point racing has nothing to do with racing. Of course there is a difference between race meets at the 26 racetracks around the country and point-to-points. There is a big difference between them, and this is not some agenda to change the people who influence and make decisions on point-to-points. There is simply a streamlining of functions around the collection of fees and registration and, of course, ensuring that the horses involved, the owners and the betting that takes place at point-to-point meets are covered by the rules. We need legislation to do this, particularly when we put public money into point-to-point racing. I do not see any change in its practical running. People turning up to point-to-points will see the exact same structure. For people who breed horses, it will be more or less the exact same structure, except that they will simply send the cheque to a different office, but the money will find its way to the hunt clubs, the Irish National Hunt Steeplechase Committee and the Turf Club. There has been much inflammatory language about this issue and it is important to establish what the facts are and the intention of the legislation.

Comments have been made about the greyhound industry. The primary focus of this legislation is the horse racing industry and ensuring we have proper modern legislation for it. There will be a forthcoming greyhound industry Bill, and people will have an opportunity to contribute to it. We have also had an Indecon report on the greyhound industry, and we have a series of recommendations which we are implementing at present. Part of this will be new legislation.

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