Media release – Cassy O’Connor MLC, Greens Animal Justice spokesperson, 10 October 2024
Final Nail in Coffin of NW Greyhound Track
After a protracted battle, a determined group of local residents working to stop TasRacing’s $40million+ NW track has been vindicated by a decision this week of the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Appeals Tribunal (TASCAT).
TASCAT upheld the residents’ appeal against the Latrobe Council approval of TasRacing’s proposed NW harness and greyhound race track.
Facing a public backlash and massive funding shortfall, TasRacing recently announced it wouldn’t be proceeding with the track at Mill Road near Devonport airport.
The locals led by Joanna Smith, and common sense, have prevailed.
The NW track would have been a complete waste of public money, entrenching the cruelty of harness and greyhound racing for at least another generation.
At a time when public support for the racing industries continues to slide, and with the State Budget deep in the red, the Rockliff Government needs to be transitioning these heavily subsidised industries out.
The racing Deed, which provides more than thirty million taxpayer dollars every year to Tasmanian racing, expires in 2029. The Deed will have funnelled more than half a billion dollars into the racing industries by then. That’s money that didn’t go towards health, housing and schools. Instead, it’s enabled animal cruelty and neglect in an industry beset by integrity problems.
The NW track fiasco is emblematic of an industry whose days are numbered.
