Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Yes. They require seed funding to do what the Minister has asked of them. If corporate management and structures were not right, the Opposition would be the first to complain and challenge the Government and the Department, so the Minister must do those things and receive assurances that the money will be spent properly. I have no doubt that the Irish Harness Racing Association wants to do that. It just needs financial assistance. I am taking this opportunity to ask once again for the Department to release seed funding to allow the association to put those structures in place and then be in a position to draw down the capital funding required to allow it to develop its potential. The Minister will know that significant investment is coming in from France and elsewhere, there is a real interest in the Irish product.

Unfortunately, it is a sport that has drifted over the years from what it was in Ireland, but it would be wonderful to bring it back again. There are high-calibre, very committed people who are currently volunteers but who want to step up. I ask the Minister if he and his Department, in a collaborative and facilitative way, could work with them on this. I would like to see the funding which they seek released in 2018. I have said so here and at the agriculture committee. That committee, on an all-party basis, has been very supportive of the Irish Harness Racing Association's potential for several years, and its support in the previous Dáil was what led to the Indecon report being commissioned.The agriculture committee continues to support it on an all-party basis, so this is not a plea from myself personally but collectively from all its members.

I am concerned about problems around alleged doping in the greyhound industry. Sadly, I must raise the matter of Clonbrien Hero. It is a disturbing debacle when The Washington Post writing about it. The trainer of Clonbrien Hero is Graham Holland. According to a report in The Sunday Times earlier this year, five greyhounds tested positive for traces of pentobarbital, a banned substance. It seems that there was not clear guidelines from the Irish Greyhound Board on dog feed and the owner was cleared. One could argue that it was a loophole, and that is the impression that I got from media reports.

The same trainer has a champion dog that has won everything. The Minister will be familiar with it having presented it with the laurel in his official capacity. It has cleaned up. It is a champion dog. It has become an international story because the same trainer is connected with this dog which has failed three drug tests, including when it won the event that the Minister had attended. The excuse that was given was that cocaine can pass from cash onto hands, following which someone might pet a dog, an idea absolutely rubbished in The Washington Post report. It said that it was nonsense that those levels of cocaine might come from any denomination of note into the bladder of a dog. There are serious issues.The Irish Greyhound Owners and Breeders Federation has raised questions about this issue, about which it has written extensively. I will wrap up on this point and I thank the Acting Chairman for his patience. The federation, which is trying to clean up the sport of greyhound racing, have made serious criticisms of Bord na gCon's lack of success in tackling doping. We should ask more of the Irish Greyhound Board when the champion dog - it is actually bitch - has been found in this position and such question marks are hanging over the industry. The Oireachtas is again releasing substantial public funding to greyhound racing industry and we debated this issue last year.

I appreciate the point made by colleagues who spoke of the financial return made by the horse and greyhound racing industries and our pride in the horse breeding sector. That is a fair point but we have a serious doping problem in the greyhound industry. The Government must confront the problem and we must demand better outcomes. It is deeply embarrassing to have The Washington Postand other international newspapers reporting on the issue. It is making a laughing stock of the industry and bringing down wonderful people involved in it. The members of the Irish Greyhound Owners and Breeders Federation are decent greyhound owners and breeders who want this issue addressed. We need to sort it out.