Chamber and committees

I note that, for the time being, racing is not happening at Thornton. Through company records, we understand that two full-time equivalent employees are, or were, based there. It is not clear whether those employees are still working, given that no greyhound racing is taking place there.

I think that the biggest implication will relate to dogs. The Scottish Greyhound Sanctuary has said, I think, that they have already taken into their care the last three dogs that raced at Thornton. When Shawfield shut, animal charities, including the Dogs Trust, managed to successfully rehome all the dogs from there—I think that they have finally all been successfully rehomed. When it comes to transition, the biggest issue is the dogs.

When it comes to the owner’s aspirations for the future of the asset that he has at Thornton, that is a private matter and a private consideration. Reports have been compiled on the potential for housing in the area. One report has looked at the suitability of the site for housing, what economic investment that could bring to Fife and the kinds of jobs that could be created. That is a live discussion with Thornton community council, given that it has a local place plan and there are housing allocations.

Those are private matters regarding what will happen afterwards. The situation right now is that Thornton is not operational. Nothing is happening there. One of the reasons why racing has stopped—alongside the campaigns and the evidence that has been taken around the bill—is that the bookie retired.

It is in line with the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006.

I go back to the fundamental point that the Scottish Parliament is concerned with Scots law. I do not believe that the Welsh Senedd has the ability to apply penalties of that kind, because it applies English law.

I will highlight the Scotland-specific data that the committee has received in the past. I point to the figures that were collected at Shawfield stadium, when it was running, between 2018 and 2020, which were produced as a result of it being licensed by the Greyhound Board of Great Britain. During that period, there were 197 injuries and 15 fatalities. We know that the injury rate at Shawfield is comparable to that at every other greyhound racing stadium across the UK.

Where specific data is available—a number of the people who have given testimony have taken dogs from Shawfield and Thornton, as well as from England—we can see that there is an impact on the dogs. Being raced on an oval track involves the same inherent risk, regardless of whether they are raced in England, Wales or Scotland.

They were part-time staff, I think, and they were probably running facilities at the venue such as bars. However, the greyhound track is not open, and it has not been open for some time.

I do not want to see the rehoming of greyhounds that have had to be rescued from the industry because they have been damaged and face trauma; I want to end that. Those who work in the greyhound rehoming sector want to end greyhound racing as well. They do not want the problem of having dozens of dogs to rehome—and, let us face it, the majority of them come from England, where about 490 trainers are racing dogs. They do not want to have to deal with that trauma or with the rehabilitation of dogs and the extensive veterinary treatment that they require.

If there is a rehoming crisis—and I believe that there is one—it is being driven across the UK by the number of dogs that are being wasted month in, month out. Young dogs at the prime of their life are facing injuries. I read out some testimonies from individuals who have rehomed greyhounds, and they very much accord with my lived experience of doing that.

The way to tackle the rehoming crisis is to end greyhound racing and end the inherent risk. That is what the bill would do in Scotland and it is what the Welsh bill will do in Wales. It is for other jurisdictions to consider—as jurisdictions around the world have done—whether they want to continue with the same numbers of dogs coming through week in, week out. It is heartbreaking. Charities are trying to find forever homes for these dogs, but there are so many. Fundamentally, the way to address the rehoming crisis is to end the need to rehome greyhounds.

I would need to reflect on individual submissions, particularly those that have come from animal welfare charities, but that has been an area of discussion with them. There is an understanding among animal welfare charities that the bill has a narrow focus; it is focused on the inherent risk associated with racing a greyhound in Scotland. However, there is a wider concern. Again, it is a question for the Scottish Government as to how it will address that concern. I would like to see some progress in that area, but that should not detract from what the bill is trying to achieve, which is the first step of establishing an offence of racing a greyhound in Scotland.

The issue comes on the back of the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 not being able to address the issues that surround the racing of greyhounds in Scotland. That is partly because greyhound racing is inherently a lawful activity, so it has been difficult to prove that there has been unnecessary suffering of greyhounds. The 2006 act has not worked, in that it has not dealt with that inherent suffering. Therefore, the only way forward, as I see it, is to bring in the offence of racing a greyhound.

My hope is that other jurisdictions will perhaps follow Scotland’s lead. The Welsh bill is going through the Senedd at the moment and there is an active discussion about the issue in Ireland. There are countries, states and jurisdictions around the world that have gone ahead and banned greyhound racing while this committee has been taking evidence. There is a direction of travel and an international consensus that creating the offence of racing a greyhound is the right way to go. I hope that, over time, such consensus will result in benefits for all dogs.

I have not taken evidence on that. On the back of the committee’s evidence and the work that it has done on this issue for many years, my conclusion was to create the offence that is in the bill. That has been the focus. If there were to be wider consideration of a licence, that would be a question for the Scottish Government.

The scope of the bill, should it get to stage 2, will be a matter for the convener. My view, and the view of the Scottish Government, is that we should focus on the stand-alone offence. I do not discount the wider issues. If you wish to discuss the matter further with the minister or with me, I would be content for that discussion to happen.

I point to the committee’s excellent report, which looked at breeding, the relationship with breeding in Ireland, kennelling and other issues. Again, those issues are outwith the scope of the bill, but the committee made helpful recommendations to the Scottish Government about the work that it wants the Scottish Government to undertake in relation to those wider concerns.

This is a member’s bill and it is tightly drawn. There are wider animal welfare implications of greyhound racing, but how the Government addresses them is properly a matter for it to consider in due course.

Yes. That is what the scientific evidence shows us. It is the nature of the high-speed race, the fact that greyhounds are very fast dogs and the forces that are exerted on the dogs that lead to injuries and deaths. I do not know whether members have ever watched a greyhound race—I have not been to a greyhound racing stadium, but I have watched many races on television, as well as excerpts of races—but they will know that the speed of the dogs is phenomenal. They enjoy running, and they will run very fast, to the point where they will injure and, potentially, kill themselves. It is important that we draw a line under that.