Analysis: Westminster backs greyhound racing amid Welsh and Scottish conflicts

On 30 October, Westminster responded to a petition to ban greyhound racing, stating: "The government has no plans to ban greyhound racing. While the government recognises the concerns some people have about greyhound racing, there is legislation in place to protect the welfare of racing greyhounds in England and a regulatory body - the Greyhound Board of Great Britain (GBGB) - that has made many improvements to greyhound welfare."

It is one of a growing number of political and public challenges to a sport which seems to have reached a delicate inflection point.

Too much racing?

One thing that the anti-greyhound lobby and those wishing to preserve the sport tend to agree upon is that there's too much of it right now.

That may surprise those who believe the sport is one in decline. While it is not as popular as it may have been before the advent of betting shops in 1961, the impression from the inside is that like a boiled school jumper it has shrunk to fit and is all the better for it.

Well nearly. Jim Cremin, IBAS Business Relationship Manager and former Manager of Wembley Racetrack, told Global Gaming Insider that the gambling industry's influence has brought about a surfeit of racing. So keen are the bookmakers to get races run, events are taking place without a full complement of dogs.

Global Gaming Insider spoke to Mark Bird, CEO of GBGB, who agreed: "My conviction at the moment is it's too much racing. Dogs are being run, not too often, but more than they need to be run."

Of course, those who fundamentally oppose the practice want the whole thing banned. At time of writing, the petition has 13,604 signatures. If it reaches 100,000 it will be considered for debate in the House of Commons.

While England maintains 18 tracks, the sport has already all but ebbed away in Wales and Scotland.

Across those two nations, there is one active track: The Valley, in the village of Hengoed. Formerly an independently run operation, it was brought under the GBGB regulatory umbrella in 2023.

There are no licensed tracks in Scotland and the last independent track closed until further notice in March 2025.

Nonetheless, it is the battlegrounds of those two devolved Governments, in which the argument is currently being played out.

Wales and Scotland

For Bird, the stories in Wales and Scotland are scandalous mirrors of the other. He has been outspoken in his belief that support for bans in the Senedd and Holyrood are no more than cynical political manoeuvring on behalf of the Welsh Labour Party and the SNP.

He called the Welsh bill in February 2025, a "dirty backroom deal," and one made to curry favour with a Lib Dem MS to get the budget through.

Mark Ruskell, the Green MSP who put forward the bill in Scotland, has been backed by the Scottish Minister for Agriculture and Connectivity, Jim Fairlie.

Bird takes an equally dim view in this instance, and shared his incredulity at the Minister's policy about turn.

He described a past occasion to Global Gaming Insider when Madeline Campbell, a Professor of Veterinary Ethics and the GBGB's Non-Executive Independent Director, was giving evidence to a much more racing-sympathetic Fairlie.

When we asked the Minister about his U-turn, Fairlie said: "At that time I was not convinced that the case had been made that a ban on greyhound racing would be proportionate based on the information available to me at that time."

Leader of the SNP, John Swinney, has failed to rule out the possibility of an SNP-Green coalition when posed the question, though Fairlie insisted to us that the ruling party's support of the greyhound bill has "no wider political implications."

Bird himself gave evidence to the Welsh Government on 23 October, and with only the one extant Welsh track in Hengoed relevant as a contemporaneous case study, the limited scope of relevant evidence seemed to stand him in good stead.

Many of the ethical and safety concerns raised, could be straight batted with the response that claims were before the GBGB-regulation of that track and not applicable to The Valley and current procedures.

A lack of practical transparency in some areas of welfare, for instance, the disappearances of dogs, can damage the argument on both sides of the track.

However, the vanishingly small amount of greyhound activity in Wales and Scotland does seem to make it difficult for opponents to present the case that there is a current problem.

Public interest

In England, activists lobby but also wait in the wings to see the outcome of the cases in Wales and Scotland.

Well before this new petition, Lisa Nandy, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport responded to the Welsh Government's plan by asserting that the UK Government has no plans to ban racing in England.

But Bird tells us that the GBGB would be naive to expect bans in Scotland and Wales not to have an impact in Westminster.

And while the external narrative might be of a dated sport in decline, boarded up kennels and racetracks carpeted with a foot of dust, in fact, the remaining tracks do good numbers and a ban in England would take a toll on those communities.

Currently Greyhound racing is number six on the list of most-attended spectator sports and typically, across the 19 remaining GBGB licensed stadia, racing takes place every day of the year bar Christmas.

We attended Romford for the Puppy Cup Final in September imagining we'd see Magical Luka romp to victory. Touted as one of the fastest pups in history and with odds shorter than a matchstick, Luka didn't get the break out of the traps and was sensationally beaten by Scooby Diamond.

The arena was almost silent, but only because the masses of punters had been stunned by the upset and because the bookmakers were desperately trying to contain their glee.

Up until then, the atmosphere had been raucous, with attendees of all ages. Cremin tells us that while of course weekdays are quieter affairs, the community still turns up in force at the weekend.

Funding

The political battles being fought north and west of the border will be pivotal in determining the long-term future of the sport across the whole of the UK, but they are not the only challenges.

Some fear that if the Blue Cross and RSPCA etc successfully end greyhound racing, they will then move more vigorously for horseracing.

Funding wise however, both sports are already under threat.

With tax rises being debated fiercely in Westminster, the prospect of harmonisation across gambling verticals is proving deeply controversial.

In September, British Horseracing organised an unprecedented strike in support of its 'Axe the Tax' campaign.

Both sports are reliant on industry funding, but while a mandatory levy supports horseracing, dog racing lives and dies on voluntary contributions.

Bird says that the taxation question is more of an existential threat to horseracing because the levy in that case is on gross profit, while for the dogs it's based on turnover.

But he has also been imploring the bookmakers to increase the voluntary contributions, something that seems less likely to be successful if the hits to bookies' profitability are as bad as industry is suggesting.

In fact, he tells us that those contributions have already gone down. And though the financial situation may not be as harsh an existential headwind as it is for the horses, it is inextricably tied to one that is.

Welfare

The RSPCA did not take up the offer of an interview, though in a statement issued after the Welsh Government backed the banning bill, Dr Samantha Gaines, RSPCA Dog Welfare Expert, said: "Since 2018, over 2,700 dogs died or were put to sleep and more than 26,500 injuries were recorded across the UK from licensed greyhound racing; this is simply unacceptable."

As far as recent injury and euthanasia numbers indicate, dog racing tends to produce less on track harm and injury to the animals than horseracing, though for some, the familiarity with dogs as pets makes the issue more sensitive.

Investment in recent years has made tangible differences, but you'd be forgiven for thinking that the most immediate funding shortfall, were taxation to make the industry less profitable overall, would be that money made available for welfare-related improvements.

Richard Brankley, Head of Greyhound Operations at SIS Betting, explained to the Senedd committee that since The Valley became a regulated track in 2023, there has been multi-million pound investment spanning track improvements, air-conditioned kennels and more on-site expertise.

Questioned as to why politicians still hear from animal rights groups about poor kennelling, husbandry standards and deficient diets, Bird responds that these are "legacy" issues.

The GBGB launched its long-term welfare strategy 'A Good Life for Every Greyhound' in 2022, but a legacy must be owned to be shaken off.

The battles that the greyhound brand, as it were, faces now, are the result of a backlog that has to be reckoned with quickly to reclaim control of the sport's perception - something the new petition reinforces, despite the current UK Government stance.

This month, the GBGB published its latest progress report on its welfare strategy, referencing improved track safety across 2024, more frequent inspections of trainers' residential kennels and enhanced veterinary oversight.

What next?

Bird says with regards to funding improvements: "The smaller it's become, the more sustainable it's become."

If the size of the sport has in fact reached a suitable plateau, and if welfare measures are really starting to make a sustainable impact on injury figures, then the future could be rosy for the sport.

The situations in Wales and Scotland, while periphery to the sport's heartlands, have the feel of meaningful proxy wars and testing grounds for the arguments in play.

If progress and popularity can be evidenced clearly, as Bird and co are fiercely attempting to do, then Friday nights at Romford may continue to be lively and good-natured get-togethers for years to come.

Dunstall Park became the first new greyhound track to open in the UK in more than a decade this September, a fair sign that behind the gauntlets set down in Scotland and Wales, lies an exciting future for the sport.

In Scotland, the bill is still at Stage 1 and will be considered by the Rural Affairs and Islands Committee. In Wales, as the latest committee meeting shows, the Senedd is proceeding with its consultation, but the results of the GBGB's claim for a judicial review may prove decisive.

It is currently at a permissions stage, and all now await whether it will result in a formal hearing next year.

In the meantime, this bill could be approved in the Senedd, but it would not be able to receive Royal Assent until the judicial review is concluded one way or the other.