Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I will start by addressing some of the blatant misinformation aired by Deputies this morning. Sinn Féin and the Government stated that €302 million is generated for the economy by the greyhound industry. There were 1,606 race meetings last year and the average attendance was 288. Are we to believe that every meeting generates €188,000? The other claim is that some of the money comes in from tourism but we all know that the vast majority of tourists do not come to Ireland to go to greyhound racing tracks.

Another common feature of the debate has been the disputing of the figures. After the RTÉ documentary, Greyhound Racing Ireland filed a complaint to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland about it. The authority investigated the complaint in full, rejected it in its entirety and found instead that "the programme was a comprehensive exploration of the topic in a factual manner which was fair, objective and impartial." It is important to put that on the record again.

I am also constantly hearing that we are referring to all trainers as terrible people who are involved in animal cruelty. I do not know how many times we have to say that we are aware not all trainers treat their dogs badly. Indeed, many of those trainers have been in touch to thank us for tabling this motion because they are so aware of how badly dogs are treated in the industry.

Many Deputies talked about employment and support for rural areas and help for farmers, which is laughable. The vast majority of rural people, farmers and fishing communities could think of so many preferable things to spend one quarter of a billion euro on. Rural populations are concerned about Brexit, about the immoral prices farmers are receiving for their product and a lack of State services. These are the issues on which the Government needs to be spending our public money. Predictably, some Deputies labelled this motion as blatantly anti-rural. This is a simplistic argument that paints all rural Ireland as uniform and conservative by default. This is not only insulting; it is simply untrue. Just because we are from rural areas does not mean we are unable to understand facts or engage in meaningful debate. A Red C poll conducted in 2019 found that only 16% of people support this industry. It is simply not true to say that the Government is representing all of rural Ireland. Claiming to have a monopoly on speaking for rural Ireland is, quite simply, ridiculous.

The Government's amendment, and, indeed, the Labour Party, speak of the great progress that will be made in animal welfare, in traceability and in greater accountability. The Government is so confident about this it is willing to give the industry €2.4 million but we know that this is blatant lip-service. Attempts by Opposition Senators and Deputies in 2019 to have clear regulations in respect of export and breeding practices were disregarded so that we know that the two most controversial malpractices in the industry will not be properly addressed.

Independent organisations, whistleblowers and other political parties know that this industry has proven to be incapable of the necessary reforms. Members of the public know this. They are voting with their feet. Sponsors and companies know this. It seems that the only people who do not know it are politicians and people who are invested in the industry. State funding has facilitated these significant deficiencies and overbreeding practices. It has insulated the industry from commercial reality and allowed Greyhound Racing Ireland to ignore public opinion. This has to stop. We have an opportunity to do it now. The Government's decision to give an extra €2.4 million to the industry in the budget, ratified by the Joint Committee on Agriculture and the Marine yesterday, can and should be halted. The remaining investment should be put towards the gradual winding down of a declining industry.

Imagine for a second if the greyhound racing industry did not exist and my colleagues and I in the Social Democrats came in here today and proposed it, using the same arguments that have been used to defend the funding of the industry. It is difficult to imagine but, I suppose, the motion on the matter would go something like this:

I propose that we create an organised competitive sport of sorts, in which dogs are raced around a track and people can go along and bet on them and I think that the Government should fund it to the tune of €19.2 million annually. The estimated loss for the taxpayer over the next four years will be approximately €30 million and, in an attempt to avoid criticism for so many millions of euro of public money being pumped into a loss-making industry, I suggest that a levy from the gambling industry be ring-fenced. Then we can use that to argue we are not using public money despite the fact that we are.

Unfortunately, in order to get dogs that I believe will run quick enough, we will have to breed approximately 16,000 of them a year. This level of overbreeding will mean that we will have to kill about 6,000 of those dogs but we can defend this overbreeding and extreme cruelty by saying that some trainers treat their dogs well and that it is the lifeblood of rural Ireland.

We also suggest that we tie it in as closely as possible with horse racing and claim that the two are intrinsically linked and that if you are against a loss-making racing industry that carries out the cruelty of greyhound racing, you are also anti-horse racing. We could even go as far as to use the employment figures from horse racing to make the whole argument more robust.

Finally, if any of this is researched and aired or published, for example, by the national broadcaster, we can just ignore it.

We all know that this would be seen as the most outrageous thing imaginable but, in reality, voting down the Social Democrats motion this evening is just as outrageous.

I am calling on all parties to stop falling prey to lobbying. The solution is clear. We need to stand up and acknowledge the reality of this industry and stop turning a blind eye to its abuse and throwing more money at its failings.

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