Don't think the bans will stop with greyhounds. They'll come for horse racing next

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19-02-2025

I hadn't realised it until this week, but Wales appears to be the only country in the world with so few problems that its government has to imagine some to keep itself occupied. Its healthcare system must be flawless. Its schools are presumably the envy of the world and crime non-existent.
It's difficult to draw any other conclusion from the announcement on Tuesday by Wales's Deputy First Minister, Huw Irranca-Davies, of his government's latest priority.
Forget the NHS, schools or crime: what really matters to the Welsh government is stopping dogs from running around Wales's only greyhound racing stadium, the Valley in Ystrad Mynach. Mr Irranca-Davies told members of the Senedd that greyhound racing will be banned in Wales 'as soon as practically possible' – which, he said, could be before the next Welsh Parliament election in May 2026.
Be in no doubt what is going on here. For many years so-called animal rights groups have targeted any pursuits in which humans use animals. The claims made by activists are almost always wildly exaggerated, based on their belief that no human should ever exercise power over an animal. They don't put it like that, of course, since it is patently mad, so they use spurious supposed facts about animal welfare, and politicians too weak or stupid to think for themselves then do the bidding of the fanatics.
Greyhound racing is no longer as popular as it once was but it still attracts 1.2 million spectators a year, particularly in the Midlands and around London. Although the prime focus of these campaigners is horse racing, greyhound racing is an easy target since it lacks the lobbying power of horse racing, a huge industry which generates £3.7 billion for the economy and is the second biggest spectator sport after football. And since there is only one greyhound track in Wales it really is a soft target.
The Welsh government has held not a single meeting with anyone involved in greyhound racing, because when you are captured by the animal rights crowd there is no place for rational thought and evidence – as the campaign against horse racing shows. Worryingly, those involved in defending racing often fail to understand this.
The usual response, for example, is that there is a need for 'engagement', with TV pundits offering to take activists around stables so they can see how incredibly well racehorses are looked after. But this completely misses the point. The campaigners aren't interested in facts, because their obsession is not about animals: it's about themselves.
For these people, protest and campaigning is its own purpose. One day it's racing, the next Gaza, and the next oil. Their actions are the consequence of the perversion of higher education, under the illusion that their juvenile ideas are the result of critical thinking rather than the postmodern drivel that has infected their minds.
There is a video on social media of Kevin Blake, the ITV racing pundit, asking one of campaigners what he plans to do with the 18,000 thoroughbreds in training in Britain if racing is banned. His inability even to comprehend the question, let alone to deal with it, says everything.
The animal rights brigade have now formed a pincer movement with anti-gambling campaigners, whose use of false and wholly misleading statistics would shame a snake oil salesman. They are aided by the Gambling Commission, which acts as if it is driven by contempt for the very activity it exists to regulate. And the fall guy for all this is horse racing, which faces a determined threat to its existence.
The snuffing out of greyhound racing may seem like small beer, but the worry is that it is a foretaste of the future.
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