Welsh Deputy First Minister, Huw Irranca-Davies, revealed plans last week to wind down the sport of greyhound racing, which has been criticised for years for being harmful to greyhound dogs. The ban on greyhound racing in Wales follows cross-party calls to outlaw the sport, as well as a government consultation and a petition which attracted more than 35,000 signatures. It seems though that the rest of the UK will not be following suit, as the UK culture secretary stated on 27 February 2025 in response to the Welsh ban.
Greyhound racing is also set to be banned in New Zealand, whose government announced in December 2024 plans to wind down the industry over the next 20 months. This time period is to allow time for the rehoming of racing dogs and for people in the industry to transition to other jobs. The change came after three reviews of the greyhound racing industry over the past decade all recommended that significant changes needed to be made in order to protect the welfare of the dogs involved in the industry. In 2021 for example, it was reported by local media outlets that 232 racing greyhounds died and 900 suffered injuries. The industry as a whole was placed “on notice” by the NZ government in September 2021, but the deaths and injuries continued, and so the NZ decided to act to protect the dogs still involved with the industry.
Hopefully this new change in Wales means that the rest of the UK will follow suit. As it stands, there are currently 19 registered greyhound race courses within the UK, which does still include the one racecourse in Wales. Perhaps this approach by Wales will help encourage the rest of the UK to also put some sort of ban in place, or at the very least encourage more transparency within the industry to ensure that the welfare of the dogs involved is kept to a high standard and that welfare is the first priority.
As you can all expect, I would fully support any sort of animal racing – horses, greyhounds etc – to be banned immediately, but I also know that this is a very popular industry within the UK and, as with all things when it comes to animal welfare, it will likely take a lot of time and research before society truly changes their views on this particular event.
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