Shane Ross (Dublin Rathdown, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I do not doubt Deputy Ferris’s bona fides on what he says about the greyhound industry or the employment it gives. I accept this is a concern but we must be aware that €16 million in Government money goes to the Irish Greyhound Board. We must be aware that the board commissioned a report from a firm called Preferred Results but when it received that report, it was not published. That report contained some unacceptable findings, including the fact that 6,000 dogs were culled simply because they could not race fast enough and that there was a culture of doing that sort of thing in the industry, which was obviously accepted. On top of this, there were other utterly unacceptable incidents, the frequency of which I am not in a position to tell, happening in the greyhound world. These were carried out on a regular basis. That report was not published until the eve of the broadcast of the programme to which we referred. It seemed to me there was absolutely no anxiety on behalf of the board of directors to make public information that has now been found to be utterly unacceptable. It has cast a dark cloud over the entire industry, which is not of Deputy Ferris's making, but is of the making of those who decided not to publish the report because of the utterly revolting activities that were going on. I did was what I feel was right, namely, that we should not use any promotion of activities that would be seen to condone in any way this disgusting behaviour. This is why I took the action I did and that is why I stand over it.

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