Source: Radio New Zealand
Greyhound racing will be banned on 31st July. 123RF
Former greyhound trainers and owners will be paid to look after the dogs until they’re re-homed, once a ban on commercial greyhound racing comes into force on 31st July.
A new government agency set up to wind down the industry and rehome the roughly 1700 dogs has met with trainers and owners across the country this week.
Greyhound Racing Transition Agency head Heather Simpson told Checkpoint those who wish to re-home their greyhound will be paid a daily rate to cover care costs until a new owner is found.
“We are talking to the trainers and owners about that at the meetings we’ve just been having. And yes, we have said that there will be a daily rate paid to cover the costs of looking after the dogs in the meantime.
“We are still in the process of determining what that final daily rate will be, and it may differ according to the circumstances. But yeah, the cost of looking after the dogs will be met by the transition agency.”
Simpson said the agency is still determining what the rate will be, but she estimates it will be “in the $20s or the $30s” a day .
“I can assure you that the figure that we come up with will be based on the actual costs which are incurred by those people looking after them,” Simpson said.
She also said that “legislation guarantees that euthanasia is not the solution to this problem.”
“We are charged with looking after the welfare of these dogs, and that’s the commitment we’re making,” Simpson added.
Simpson said the money for the transition is coming from TAB.
“It’s money that was previously essentially going into greyhound racing and it’s being used to fund the transition programme.”
The agency aims to re-home all greyhounds in two years, but Simpson said it wasn’t going to be a “speedy process”.
Greyhound Racing New Zealand has been running a re-homing programme for a number of years and Simpson said there are already agencies set up to help with the re-homing.
“At the moment we re-home about 600 to 700 greyhounds a year anyway. We just want to increase that so that the 1700 odd greyhounds that are left don’t wait too long for a good home.”
Simpson was confident welfare standards of the dogs will be met, and she said the agency will also help with retraining, redeployment, and support for industry workers in partnership with the Ministry of Social Development.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
