Soft penalties for abuse

Soft penalties for abuse

Greyhound trainer who bashed the heads of four dogs with a hammer and buried them gets $3250 fine and no jail time – Feb, 2024.

Published research shows most Australians feel strongly that penalties for animal abuse are too low.

This also applies to greyhound racing, but the dog racing industry constantly hands out a mere slap on the wrist to its members. For example: Although life bans exist in theory, they are rarely used by greyhound racing industry bodies and only when the crimes are horrendous. Even then, serious offenders banned in Australia sometimes get a job elsewhere. For example:
Worse still, when a dog racing industry participant is banned for life, there’s no longer any incentive for them to pay the fines levied upon them. Consequently, the racing industry announces big fines which it knows it will never be able to collect, but which will give the public and the media the impression that it is policing wrongdoers.


About industry penalties

It’s also not easy to find information about greyhound racing offence investigations and penalties on the internet. We’ve listed where they can be found for each state racing body here:
For more detail on each state racing body’s lax penalty system, scroll down to CPG’s state regulatory reports here.
Penalties are different in each state so it is difficult to compare them nationally. There are also different levels of transparency, e.g., information about Queensland offences is only available for six months, after which it is removed.

The RSPCA has long specified wide-ranging regulatory standards for the greyhound racing industry which state governments have failed to implement.

Those standards include the:
  • comprehensive regulation of greyhound racing by an independent body with a formal and complete separation of the integrity and regulatory functions from the commercial functions,
  • adoption of compulsory and enforced animal welfare standards for greyhounds at all life stages to eliminate practices that cause injury, pain, suffering or distress and ensure all greyhounds have a good quality of life,
  • adoption of formal processes to address over-supply and wastage rates – there should be an expectation and formal processes in place within the industry that greyhounds will be rehomed as a companion animal on retirement and provisions made to ensure their welfare,
  • mandatory collection and publication of comprehensive lifecycle (birth to death records) and injury statistics and the development of a national identification and traceability system for all greyhounds to ensure each greyhound born is accounted for.

Governments want to avoid anything that might reduce the betting tax they get from racing or alienate conservative voters in regional electorates with tracks or anger the powerful racing and gambling industries.

CPG’s series of regulatory reports about the failings of each state’s regulation of the greyhound racing industry are available here (scroll down). Also, you can read about the regulatory structure in each state here.

Related media coverage:
November 28, 2023 – ABC Radio Melbourne, Calls to end all taxpayer spending on greyhound racing, Emile Pavlich
This three-minute radio item covers CPG’s new regulatory report which says that the Victorian Government’s response to date on greyhound welfare has failed to stop greyhounds suffering pain and harm.
November 27, 2023- ABC TV news bulletin (Victoria), CPG Victorian regulatory report
This news item highlights CPG’s call to stop funding greyhound racing in Victoria with public money.
April 28, 2023 – ABC Radio Adelaide news (SA)Interview with Elle Trahair on doping and CPG’s SA regulatory report
CPG’s Elle Trahair commented on the doping of the dogs in the racing industry, as part of the findings in our new SA regulatory report.
April 28, 2023 – ABC News Adelaide (SA) Greyhound welfare watchdog calls for out-of-competition drug testing to counter doping in racing industry Leah MacLennan An anti-greyhound racing organisation has called for better regulation of doping in the industry, labelling current controls as “antiquated”, “predictable” and “easily circumvented”, in its new report on SA greyhound industry regulation.

Media resources