Dr WOODRUFF (Franklin – Leader of the Greens) – Honourable Speaker, this week marks one year since the Liberals announced their policy to end greyhound racing. It’s a popular policy, with 74 per cent of Tasmanians polled last year supporting it. Despite what the industry spin says, this isn’t radical. Australia is one of the few places on the planet you can still race greyhounds. It has been gradually banned around the world because of overbreeding, high rates of unavoidable track injuries and the untimely death of dogs.
This is exactly what we saw on the deleted race footage the Greens RTI-ed from Tasracing that was revealed a month or so ago. Tasracing removed video after video because of the graphic footage of dogs falling, tumbling, colliding and breaking. Our RTI captured just one year of deleted footage, a year of dogs crashing into each other or the deck, dogs with broken limbs flapping. These types of injuries were what New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters referred to in his decision to end greyhound racing – a decision unanimously supported by the New Zealand parliament and all the parties in it. It’s why just 11 days ago the last ever greyhound race was run on the other side of the Tasman.
While the Liberals understood the mood of the community, Tasmanian Labor are still in the same heartless boat. It is staggering that one of the only things Tasmanians can point to as a policy difference between Labor and the Liberals is greyhound racing. Imagine deciding that the only major policy you want to take a stand on is the exploitation of dogs.
It hasn’t always been this way for Labor, it seems. Just last week we heard former Labor treasurer Michael Aird reiterate his support for banning greyhound racing on statewide radio. He said:
I think society should be judged by the way it treats animals as they would treat any other innocent, vulnerable person.
Mr Aird also said:
When I was minister, my last final departing gesture to the Tasracing board was to say that they’ve got two issues in front of them which are going to involve animal welfare. One was greyhounds, and I suggested that that be phased out.
While the former opposition leader and the current one pretend a ban on greyhound racing has come out of nowhere, the reality is that they’ve been on notice for almost 20 years. Not only that, but they were put on notice by Labor. We know Labor’s position today is regressive. It is nearly two decades behind not only community expectations but also their own.
How can it be that Tasmanian Labor was more progressive, empathetic, and socially aware in 2009 than today’s party under Josh Willie? Labor’s cruel position on greyhounds is clearly not sitting comfortably within their membership and nor, do we believe, within their own party room. We heard Mr Aird’s comments and those of former Labor premier David Bartlett. We’ve heard the stories of members hauling MPs over the coals at branch meetings. We know there are also members of the Parliamentary Labor Party who didn’t want this.
What reason can Labor have to maintain their heartless position on greyhound racing? Even if you don’t consider the ethics, this industry is deeply unpopular. Labor has changed its policy on all manner of things: pokies, anti‑protest laws, mandatory minimum sentences. And how many time can you count that they have changed their position on the stadium? Surely the torturing of dogs can’t be the only position the parliamentary Labor Party won’t be swayed on.
I urge the animal lovers of Tasmania to send a message to Labor. Give those Labor MPs and MLCs who want a humane policy change fuel for their fire. Get in touch with your local Labor member and urge them to get with modern-day standards, or at least those of 2009 Labor, and to change their policy on greyhounds.
