ACT Greens call for government to stop $40 million horse racing deal

The territory government's five-year memorandum of understanding with Thoroughbred Park will expire this week but negotiations are under way to continue the agreement for the next five years.

The memorandum would mean the government would provide at least $7.5 million per year to the industry.

ACT Greens spokeswoman for animal welfare Jo Clay said the party did not support that amount of public funding going towards horse racing, arguing the money could be better spent. She said the process was problematic, as it did not go through a public procurement process.

"It's going through without any kind of public procurement process, without any kind of public grant process and we just can't support that level of public funding to the horse racing industry," Ms Clay said.

"We've actually all been through quite a lot in the last couple of years. We're struggling with COVID, with climate change disasters, with homelessness and housing affordability.

"There are so many ways we need to spend $40 million of taxpayer funding and I just can't see how we could possibly prioritise $40 million going into the horse racing industry when we have all these major social and environmental problems to deal with."

It is understood the proposal went before the territory's cabinet last week but the Greens ministers would not offer their support.

The ACT government has had the memorandum of understanding with Thoroughbred Park since 2013.

An ACT government spokeswoman said it would proceed with the new agreement and said the funding was a small portion of the territory's budget.

She said the new memorandum would include key performance indicators related to animal welfare, transparency and economic diversification. This would include the development of proposals to limit the use of whipping in some ACT race meetings.

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The spokeswoman also argued many jobs would be lost if the memorandum was terminated.

"The ACT Greens position on horse racing and the discontinuation of the MoU is noted and was formally recorded under the cabinet decision-making terms of the Parliamentary and Governing Agreement," the spokeswoman said.

"The ACT government will proceed with the revised MoU as supported by the majority of cabinet.

"The MoU outlines an agreed quantum of funding for the next five years consistent with the long-standing funding arrangements to the ACT racing industry.

"The financial support provided through the MoU is a very small component of the total ACT budget.

"The government has many responsibilities that we must consider through the budget process, including the protection of local jobs. If the MOU were to be terminated, this would mean the loss of many in the local industry."

Ms Clay said the Greens wanted the government to commit to a transition plan to gradually stop public funding to the industry. She said the party was not calling for a ban on horse racing.

Jo Clay opinion: It's time to end ACT's $40m horse racing subsidy

"We think it is time to end the public subsidy and instead to put together a transition plan that will look after the workers and look after the industry and give us stepped down funding and we weren't able to reach agreement on that," Ms Clay said.

"We're not calling to ban the horse racing industry, we're not tabling legislation about that. What we're saying it that if you're going to spend this amount of money in this manner on one industry you need to be able to justify what the people of Canberra are getting for it and I have not seen that justification."

However, it is the Greens policy to advocate for a review into the animal welfare impacts of horse racing in the ACT. The party has also advocated for a Royal Commission into cruelty and abuse in horse racing.

Ms Clay pointed to funding given to other sports as a basis for the Greens' arguments. She said the government gave $2.6 million a year to the Raiders, $1.78 million a year to the Brumbies and $1.6 million over four years to both the Canberra Capitals and Canberra United.

She said the party would continue to campaign on the issue.

Going into the 2020 election, the Canberra Liberals promised to increase the funding given to the Canberra Racing Club.

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