Australian jumps racing faces possible end

RACING NEWS:MORE THAN 150 years of jumps horse racing in Australia could come to an end today, as officials decide whether to keep the sport alive amid recent horse deaths and rising community pressure.

Three dead horses at a country racing carnival last week triggered an immediate suspension of jumps racing in the southern state of Victoria, one of only two Australian states that hold the sport, pending an emergency review.

The suspension has polarised public opinion in the sports-mad country, where the biggest jumps carnivals draw tens of thousands of punters, but also attract criticism from animal rights groups.

“We hope that Racing Victoria takes into account all the deaths and injuries and bans jumps racing permanently, it’s certainly the only ethical decision to make,” Glen Oogjes, executive director of Animals Australia, said yesterday.

In Victoria, where most jumps events and horses are trained, industry veterans’ anger has taken on Godfather-esque overtones.

Racing stewards charged local jumps trainer David Londregan with bringing the sport into disrepute on Monday, after he threatened to send severed horse heads to the state racing minister, who has thrown his weight behind the review. Jockeys and trainers have pledged to mount legal action against regulators should there be a ban, saying lost jobs and incomes would mean hundreds of horses being destroyed.

“The activists are totally opposed to racing in any form. They will not be satisfied until is racing is stopped completely,” said trainer Fran Houlahan, who will make a submission to the review panel today.

“I think to cave into them and ban jumps racing would be the first step on the road to the death of (all) racing,” added an emotional Houlahan.

The ban would inevitably harm racing in neighbouring South Australia state, which relies on Victorian horses to field races, and where officials have slammed their eastern counterparts for pandering to pressure groups.

“It would have a negative impact. Whether we could try to turn that into a positive is hard to say, but it would be difficult,” said Thoroughbred Racing South Australia chief Philip Bentley.

“What the animal liberation groups overlook is what will happen to the horses. (They) would be converted into dog food. That’s just the cold, hard economic reality.”

Since the jumps racing season began on March 31st, seven horses have died in different venues, where thin soil layers on sun-baked race tracks prove far more lethal for falling horses than softer tracks abroad.

Animal rights groups estimate the risk of a serious injury to jockey and horse during a jumps event at 10 to 20 times more than that of flat racing.

Three horses perished last week at Warrnambool, a gentile seaside town four hours southwest of Melbourne, whose annual three-day carnival generated $15 million to the town’s economy last year, according to organisers.

Jumps race organisers, particularly those in struggling small communities across southern Australia’s vast countryside, think it a risk worth taking.

“We’re trying very hard not to make (falls) a part of the game here,” said Andrew Pomeroy, chief executive of the Warrnambool Racing Club.

“We are trying to get to a point to say ‘what’s an acceptable level, what isn’t’? We’ve got to get that from a society point of view. Not necessarily a minority.”