Broadcaster puts questions to Irish racing's governing body ahead of documentary on slaughter of retired racehorses

Ireland's national broadcaster has put questions to Horse Racing Ireland, mainly about traceability, ahead of an hour-long documentary due to be aired next Wednesday which will delve into what happens to horses after their racing career ends.

RTE Investigates: Horses – Making A Killing will be shown on RTE One and the RTE Player on June 12 at 9.35pm and John Osborne, director of equine welfare and bloodstock at HRI, said some questions have been asked of HRI ahead of the show.

The programme is expected to put the spotlight on an abattoir in Straffan, County Kildare, which is the only active slaughterhouse for horses in the country.

Osborne said: "HRI is aware that RTE is working on a documentary and we have answered some RTE questions mostly concerned with traceability. Equine welfare is our number one priority and we strive for the highest standards of safety and care for our horses."

It will be an uncomfortable week for the industry as a BBC Panorama investigation into racehorses being sent to slaughterhouses, which was shown back in 2021, remains fresh in the memory.

The programme was entitled The Dark Side Of Horse Racing and reported that 4,000 former racehorses were slaughtered in Britain and Ireland in a two-year period between 2019 and 2021.

The documentary featured footage from UK abattoir F Drury & Sons, of methods being used to slaughter the animals, including horses being taken together into a kill room and the use of rifles on horses.

Tammys Hill: a previous programme included microchip fraud allegations involving the Cheltenham Festival winnerCredit: Patrick McCann

A light was also shone on the issue of microchips being swapped, prompting HRI to request that the Gardai and the Department of Agriculture investigate allegations of microchip fraud after the programme suggested that the microchip of Tammys Hill, a winner at the 2014 Cheltenham Festival, ended up in another horse sent to the Swindon abattoir five years after he was fatally injured during the Irish Grand National.

Brian Kavanagh, the chief executive of HRI at the time, stressed that the images broadcast "were abhorrent to all within Irish racing and in no way reflect the care and attention given to the overwhelming majority of horses in Ireland".

A statement from World Horse Welfare called on all industry stakeholders to "sit up and take note" in terms of ensuring the highest possible horse care standards, while months afterwards the BHA introduced a policy that excluded all British racehorses from the food chain.

Since January 1, 2022, declarations to race are not accepted for any British horse unless it has been stamped out of the food chain, thereby reducing its value for the slaughter trade. However, a blanket policy is not possible in Ireland due to EU law, which only legislates for horses to be stamped out on medical grounds if they have received particular medications that would preclude them from entering the food chain.

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