Racing Minister Grant Robertson has issued a very clear 'shape up or ship out' message to the NZ greyhound racing industry, after a Government proble into continuing animal welfare concerns.
"I want to be clear today, the greyhound racing industry is on notice - either make the improvements needed or risk closure," says Robertson.
Dog racing has undergone two previous reviews over the past decade, with the 2017 Hansen Report setting out 20 recommendations for local administrators to meet, if they wished to continue their license.
Last year, Greyhound Racing NZ told the Government it had made all the necessary improvements and would no longer report back on progress, but Robertson was not satisfied and appointed retired Appeal Court judge Sir Bruce Robertson to review its claims.
That work is now complete, with Sir Bruce's verdict triggering an angry reaction from the Minister.
"Sir Bruce Robertson carried out a thorough review of the industry, meeting with interest groups from both within greyhound racing and outside," says Grant Robertson. "He also met with individual trainers and breeders.
"His report makes it clear the social licence to operate the sport of greyhound racing is under challenge. He concluded that if Greyhound Racing NZ wants to secure its future, it must demonstrate the decency of the industry, but it has made its job harder by unnecessarily obfuscating information and pushing back against those with an interest.
"All information should be recorded and it should be available. Arguably, GRNZ has data to support its stances on the issues raised in Sir Bruce's report, but it is seen as unwilling to share it."
The review has identified three areas of ongoing concern - data recording, transparency of all activities and animal welfare.
"I am asking the Racing Integrity Board to identify a specific set of indicators over each of the three headings that will be used to assess the industry's progress, reporting back to me before the end of 2022," says Minister Robertson.
"This is shorter than the period Sir Bruce has recommended, but I believe the urgency of the matters raised in the report justify that."
One area of concern raised by Sir Bruce was euthanasia, where GRNZ had made a conscious effort to reduce - and in many cases eliminate - the number of dogs put down over the past four years, often risking "poor animal welfare outcomes".
"While it seems counterintuitive to suggest euthanasia rates increase, GRNZ and the industry must consider whether the reputation of the industry based on a single metric is being prioritised over animal welfare standards," says Sir Bruce.
GRNZ data shows 923 greyhounds have been euthanised over the past four years, although those numbers have dropped from 348 in 2018 to 103 so far this year.
But while half of them have been attributed to aggression, illness or accident/injury, the other half have been recorded as "non-medical" and "no reason given".
"This raised concern regarding the detail in which information is kept and in some cases, it was submitted that this suggested GRNZ was intentionally obscuring the data."
Sir Bruce concedes the emotion surrounding this pastime - and its own unhelpful attitude - make it hard to gauge progress.
"As evidenced by the petition which I am advised will shortly to be presented to Parliament, there remains a significant view in the wider community that greyhounds are merely a commodity, which are exploited in an effort to feed an appetite for gambling," he says.
"For this section of society, the problems will only be removed if New Zealand ceases to be one of the seven places in the world where greyhound racing still occurs. Anything less is seen as tinkering, and the improvements are human centric and do not grapple with underlying issues of animal welfare."
