Thanks to everyone who supported my Animal Welfare (Jumps Racing) Amendment Bill to ban jumps racing in South Australia.
The thousands of people who contacted me and my Parliamentary colleagues show overwhelmingly that the community does not support jumps racing. There is no doubt that your emails, letters and phone calls sent a clear message that politicians can no longer ignore.
As you’ll have heard however, my bill did not have the numbers to pass through the Upper House on Wednesday night.
There are however many positives to be taken from the experience. This is by no means the end of the campaign to ban jumps racing. It is in fact more like ‘quarter time’ in the game, and there are a number of factors that have emerged that are indeed ‘game changers’.
We have now for the first time on the record the Law Society’s submission that along with supporting the bill, also opined that jumps racing may in fact already be in contravention of the existing Animal Welfare Act section 13 (1) and 13 (2). This salient point was circulated to all MPs and was publicised via a media release that generated substantial media interest.
I am very grateful to the Animal Law Committee of the Law Society for producing such an extensive submission. This in turn has given the RSPCA (and possibly others) the ammunition to consider a legal challenge to jumps racing.
The public statements from former SAJC CEO Mr Steve Ploubidis openly and aggressively challenging the ‘common wisdom’ of the pro-jumps arguments of the TRSA were also helpful, albeit coming late in the piece.
I was pleased the bill received support from my parliamentary colleagues the Hon Kelly Vincent and the Hon Ann Bressington, as well of course as my Greens colleague the Hon Mark Parnell. Comments from Independent Hon John Darley indicate that he is at least open-minded and no doubt could be provided with further information to address his specific concerns.
We have also seen from the comments of the Hon Ian Hunter that the ALP does not speak with one voice on this topic and we now know from ‘corridor conversations’ that he is by no means the only MP that did not share the ‘party line’ (which consisted primarily of a regurgitated version of the Thoroughbred Racing SA (TRSA) “Arguments in Favour of Jumps Racing” document that formed the basis of part of the Liberal response also).
We know too that the Liberals are keen to be seen as animal lovers and this gives us scope to refine our lobbying.
We were also informed by a backbencher that the ALP had not in fact debated the bill in their Caucus (despite it being on the Notice Paper for some months prior to yesterday). Conversations with many members also indicate that current Minister Kenyon’s opinion that the 2001 corporatisation of the racing industry somehow left it above and beyond the law are not shared by all of his colleagues. In fact, we have received legal opinions from a number of sources that suggests this is simply ludicrous.
The impending change in leadership within the ALP after October 20th will obviously offer possibilities too for a re-invigorated campaign looking to influence the Premier-in-waiting Jay Weatherill and what will almost certainly be a reshuffled front bench. I certainly hope I can count on your continuing support with this.
It’s been an enormous amount of work to get this far, but this effort has generated the interest and awareness we need to take the campaign further.
Special mention should be given to the Coalition for the Protection for Racehorses, the RSPCA, the Animal Law Committee of the Law Society of SA and Animals Australia, all of whom have contributed significantly to the campaign to ban jumps racing to date.
With all these factors combined, it gives me great hope that jumps racing is now clearly on the wrong side of history. It didn’t get banned on Wednesday, but it has a limited future. The campaign is not over with the defeat of this bill. With your ongoing support we can and will ensure that we will finally see an end to jumps racing here in South Australia in the not-too-distant future.
Thank you again for your support of my bill and the campaign to ban jumps racing.
Tammy x
PS If you’d like to stay in touch with the campaign to Ban Jumps Racing here in South Australia you can join the mailing list for the Coalition for the Protection of Racehorses by sending an email to local co-ordinator Meagan: mlamming@bigpond.com
PPS If you have not already, you may also be interested in becoming my facebook friend or a following me on Twitter. Tx
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