Welfare of Racing Greyhounds Regulations 2010

I was a member of the animal welfare group that looked into this matter. While the noble Lord, Lord Bilston, has had greyhounds that run, whenever I go to a track, unfortunately for me, I never win at all. So whatever I say in relation to that does not apply. I am pleased that we are going as far as we are, but I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, that we should go much further. We should be looking at what happens with the breeders, the kennels and the rest. I am concerned about the fact that there are still greyhounds—we estimated 4,700 in the report—that are unaccounted for. This is a start. I was pleased to hear the noble Lord, Lord Bilston, say that it was not the end; that we have to go much further. We have to see what happens to the dogs. I agree with what was said about Irish dogs, which account for a large percentage of our greyhounds. In many cases they do not enjoy even the minimum welfare standards that we have here and that needs to be looked at. Something needs to be done about them because greyhound racing is very dependent on dogs coming in from Ireland. I shall not prolong the debate because many of the things I wanted to say have been said. We ought to be able to account for a greyhound from its birth, through its short racing life and through to what happens to it when it has finished racing. I look forward to these regulations being only the start. We should extend them to breeders and trainers and ensure that good welfare standards also apply when greyhounds have finished racing.