Irish owners' group lobbies for its members to be allowed back on racecourses

The Association of Irish Racehorse Owners (AIRO) has lobbied Horse Racing Ireland and the Department of Agriculture for owners to be recategorised as essential and not spectators at race meetings.

Representations have also been made for HRI to reinstate the pre-Covid levels of prize-money, especially at the lower level, and for a reduction in the annual fees an owner has to pay.

AIRO manager Regina Byrne said: "We sent a submission into HRI and the Department of Agriculture and I'm keeping my fingers crossed. The HRI board meeting is on Monday and Caren Walsh, our HRI board member, will be attending the meeting. We're hoping to hear some positive news afterwards."

Byrne added: "We're trying to get some money ring-fenced specifically for owners at racecourses. We have also had an awful amount of queries about Dundalk and the balloting issue there. There's a huge demand for more races at the lower level at this time of year and we have relayed that to HRI as well."

Asked how hopeful she was of a positive outcome in time for owners to return for the festive period, Byrne said: "Owners have continued to pay their way and are getting very little bang for their buck. They're sustaining 30,000 jobs and if there weren't owners there would be no racecourses and there would be no industry."

She added: "They're the chain that keeps the whole thing going and the proposal we put in to HRI and the Department is very fair and we’d like them to acknowledge it. If the country is opening up and every dog in the street is allowed into a shopping centre, we feel owners should be allowed to go racing. It just doesn’t make sense the way things are now."

Meanwhile, the bitter internal dispute between AIRO leaders was brought to an end when Gardai closed an investigation into alleged misuse of funds made by chairman Brian Polly in March.

Vice-chairman David Hyland said: "I am pleased that this matter has been brought to a conclusion. We were first made aware that a complaint had been made to An Garda Síochána by our chairman on March 30."

He added: "Despite numerous written and verbal requests, our chairman refused to provide any substantive information on the nature or the subject matter of his complaint and therefore our ability to investigate it internally was significantly compromised."

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