John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)

The reference to public trainer's licence is used to facilitate the exemption from registration fees to which the public greyhound trainer will be entitled. This will eliminate the costs associated with registration for trainers which was a cause of concern for the Irish Coursing Club whose members I wish to thank for their positive input to this Bill. The Senators will see that I, in turn, have made every effort by way of amendments to meet their legitimate concerns.

The regulations of 1961 state: "public trainer" means a person holding a licence from the [greyhound] Board authorising him to train and manage greyhounds for reward". The public trainer differs from a private trainer in that a private trainer is authorised to have no more than four greyhounds and, therefore, would not fall within the scope of this Bill.