Greyhound Racing

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS (14:55): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before addressing a question to the Minister for Recreation, Sport and Racing on the topic of acceptable greyhound racing death and injury rates.

Leave granted.

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS: Australia is an outlier when it comes to mixing greyhound racing with betting and has by far the largest commercial greyhound racing industry in the world. But that field is small. Including our nation, only seven countries globally continue to have such an industry and even that has numbers steadily decreasing. For example, there are only two tracks left in the US and both are in West Virginia.

The New Zealand government has recently banned greyhound racing due to an 'unacceptable injury rate'—an injury rate of 25.17 per thousand starters. In the financial year 2022-23, Greyhound Racing SA reported that the injury rate here in our state was higher than that, with 29.4 injuries per thousand starters. We don't know yet what last year's figures are because Greyhound Racing SA is yet to publish its 2023-24 annual report, online at least, and I believe they are the only state greyhound racing body yet to do so.

But what we do know is that in that year 17 greyhounds died on South Australian tracks, compared to 12 in 2023. Greyhound tracks are inherently dangerous. The oval tracks of South Australia cause the dogs to bunch together at turns and running at 60 km/h serious injuries are inevitable. According to the Coalition for the Protection of Greyhounds, 71 per cent of SA racing deaths in the last year were catastrophic injuries suffered at track turns and 88 per cent of those fatal injuries were leg fractures, which could have been treated.

My question to the minister therefore is: what is the greyhound death and injury rate per thousand starters that the Malinauskas government will deem acceptable for this cruelty to continue?

The Hon. E.S. BOURKE (Minister for Emergency Services and Correctional Services, Minister for Autism, Minister for Recreation, Sport and Racing) (14:57): I thank the honourable member for her question and her ongoing interest in this space, and for good reason. As members in this chamber know, the Graham Ashton recommendations are clear: the greyhound industry must change urgently or lose broader support from the South Australian community to continue to operate. I am happy to have ongoing discussions in this space with the member and other members of this chamber because we need to make sure that the integrity is kept in this space. I am happy to keep having these conversations and take on that data and get a response back to you as well.