Dear Supporter,
In this newsletter:
- MYER ends Melbourne Cup partnership, FINALLY!
- Singapore ends horse racing
- Discarded thoroughbreds at sales
- Bouvry feedlot investigation
- Warrnambool jumps carnival – RIP St Arnicca
- Spate of QLD track deaths
- Horse racing cruelty in the international spotlight
- Pateman and Barton disqualification
- Racing are their own judge and jury
- Peter V’landys loses ABC defamation case
- Raffle! Raffle! Raffle!
- Past and Upcoming Protests
MYER ENDS MELBOURNE CUP PARTNERSHIP!
Thank you MYER
This is amazing news!
After a forty year partnership, Myer has finally pulled the pin on horse racing. Myer’s chief executive John King said it was a difficult decision to end the sponsorship, but one that “aligns with our ongoing strategic objectives and marketing priorities”.
This comes after years of solid campaigning by CPR directed at the department store to stop glamourising the ugly business of gambling and animal abuse.
We hosted demonstrations outside the store, coordinated letter writing campaigns, developed our ‘10 Reasons Why your Business Should Not Be Associated With Horse Racing‘ educational outreach kit, and most fantastically, through our annual online ‘Hijack Myer Fashions on the Front Lawn’ action, so many of you posted fab photos of yourselves saying #nuptothecup from the absolutely divine, to the hilarious, to the grotesque and the outrageous.
Our awesome collaboration with Tenfingerz joining our Nup to the Cup event, facilitated the most fun Farshans on the Field human races, demonstrating you can have an amazing time without supporting animal abuse.
And most recently, through our collaboration with Collective Fashion Justice, Fashion Standing With Horses campaign, you reached out directly to the MYER board members and marketing team and let them know you’d no longer support their store so long as they sponsored horse abuse.
You all told Myer in many different ways to say #nuptothecup and they’ve finally listened.
Huge love and thanks to every single person who helped make this happen!
Please consider taking a moment to thank Myer via email at [email protected] You can also sign our petition to keep the pressure on other racing sponsors here.
From the SMH article:
“The departure of Myer is yet another example of lifestyle brands distancing themselves from horse racing, as concerns over issues like the cost-of-living and animal welfare loom large for younger demographics.”
Read more about Myer cutting ties with horse racing here.
SINGAPORE ENDS HORSE RACING
Last month Singapore announced that after 180 years, there would no longer be horse racing in the country beyond October 2024. Singapore plans to make space for public housing amid declining popularity of the industry. More here.
CPR called on Albo to follow suit. “What better way to help address Australia’s housing crisis and support people experiencing homelessness – offering city dwellers greater access to green open spaces and healthy leisure activities rather than gambling on animal abuse.”
Racing Post stated: “Falling attendances, exacerbated in the post-Covid-19 era, as well plummeting wagering turnover, have resulted in prize-money being slashed and the horse population decreasing by a quarter in the space of four years from 2014 to 2018, the last time statistics of this nature were published.”
Nice move Singapore!
DISCARDED THOROUGHBREDS AT SALES
CPR volunteers tracked three horse sales across six days. Among the sales – Andrew Wilson, Laidley, and Triangle, we were able to identify thirty thoroughbreds.
In summary:
- Four were still listed as “active” racehorses by the industry’s own records
- The highest prize money was $139,844 – the lowest $0 of which there were several
- Seven had never been raced – the most anyone had been raced was forty-eight times
- Eleven were sold – the highest price for $1,100 – the lowest just $175
- Seventeen were “passed in”, unable to reach reserves of even $300
- Two were “withdrawn” from the sale
- Many were in poor condition
- Most appeared defeated
- All were knowingly being sold to strangers, their fate unknown.
Meanwhile, we also tracked the Magic Millions online sale, where another forty-four thoroughbreds were listed, of which eighteen were being sold as “breeders”, having already been used to birth sixty-four LIVE foals between them.
Just four of their stories are featured in the graphics below and a further fifteen here.
Dear fifteen year old ‘Electric Current’ has so far been used to breed eight of those LIVE foals (plus two dead at birth) in just eleven years. She was “passed in” with a reserve of just $600. Almost half of the other horses were also “passed in” – mostly “breeders”. Some of the “active” racehorses up for sale had been raced as recently as just days and weeks prior.
Countless others have already this month been sold direct to knackeries and kill buyers, shot out the back paddock or put through racing approved on-farm killing programs.
Please – read and share their stories (listed here), then take the pledge to never bet on or watch a horse race again here.
BOUVRY FEEDLOT INVESTIGATION
New research: Horse meat from torture production in Canada.
View the full length film here.
Since 2012, our international partners at Animal Welfare Foundation have been researching imports of horse meat from torture production. Their latest research from 2021 to 2023 proves horse meat sourced from horrific abuse endured by horses in Canada still arrives to the EU and Switzerland for human consumption.
Nearly 50% of the horses slaughtered at the Canadian slaughterhouse, Bouvry, come from the United States. In order to reduce the consumer risk of drug residues in meat, due to many having being used as “sports horses” including racing, horses must endure six months of living in terrible conditions whilst being fattened up before slaughter. Their new documentary shows how catastrophic the conditions are.
Help us end torture production horse meat imports. Support our petition to the EU Commission here.
REST IN PEACE ST ARNICCA
The below words are from a CPR volunteer who witnessed the death of St Arnicca in a jumps race on Tuesday 2 May 2023 at Warrnambool. We are so grateful to those who make such sacrifices to help end the abuse of these magnificent beings.
“St Arnicca took a very long time to die. He did not die well. He suffered terribly. His leg spun like a spinning top from his fetlock. He reared in terror, fought against death in fear and horrific pain. He was six years old, he wanted to live.
The killers held him down with ear twists. They brought another horse in to keep him quiet. That horse was forced to stand beside St Arnicca while they killed him.
Perhaps the level of adrenaline and agony prevented the anaesthetic from working quickly. Perhaps they had to inject him again: he took a lot of killing. It was a very long death. It went on and on, maybe half an hour. It was not instant. It was not humane.
Back at the grandstand, trainers thumped each other on their backs and punched the air in celebration, the crowd roared as St Arnicca lay dying a short distance away on the track. He’d fallen another year at the same jump; this time would be his last.
When it was done, when he was finally gone, they took his body away and dumped it in a shed far from the party to be collected later. The death float returned to trackside in readiness for the next.
Sweet boy we saw you, we heard you, you were not just nothing. We will remember. We are so sorry. Rest in peace.”
CPR have been in touch with people who attended the races that day when St Arnicca was killed. They were only a few hundred metres away and had no idea, until a friend who had seen our footage (available here) brought it to their attention later that day. This is how good the industry is at hiding the cruelty they inflict. You can be right there at the races and have no idea. An important reminder as to why it is so important that we share the truth and educate as much as we can.
A few days after St Arnicca’s death we exposed the zero regard staff showed, laughing as his body lay lifeless. There was public outrage and rightly so. Watch here.
SPATE OF QUEENSLAND TRACK DEATHS
Of course it’s not only jumps racing causing such immense suffering. At least one horse is injured and killed on racetracks across Australia every 2.5 days.
Queensland usually accounts for two of these deaths on average per month. However, the sunny state has seen eleven horses injured and killed on its racetracks in the past six weeks.
We have emailed the Queensland Racing Integrity Commission asking what they are doing to address the high frequency of deaths. We’ve also made it clear that even one death in the name of gambling profits and entertainment is unacceptable to us and a growing portion of the general public. We are yet to receive a response.
Huge love and thanks to those who protested outside the recent Caloundra Cup, where one of the recent deaths occurred inside.
Rest in Peace Little Trojan, Zatara, Cooeebaymagic, Miralie, Dominique, Duchess Rothesay, Beau Epoch, Cossie, Star Spirit, Broadway Babe and Yowza.
HORSE RACING CRUELTY IN THE INTERNATIONAL SPOTLIGHT
The huge number of track deaths at both the Grand National Carnival, UK and at Churchill Downs, USA – the home of the Kentucky Derby, has thrust the cruelty of horse racing into the global spotlight (LA Times coverage here.) So too has the brave actions of animal rights activists who delayed the start of the Grand National by occupying the track. CPR gave comment to Yahoo News here. The despicable Grand National can be seen here. It is hard to even believe this still takes place.
An important article was published in The Guardian by ex industry participant, Elizabeth Banicki. What do horses feel at the Kentucky Derby? Mostly fear and pain – available here,
CPR Aotearoa Team Leader, Sandra Kyle, also had a piece published after the jumps death of He’s Ric – read here.
IT ONLY TOOK FIVE YEARS…
It has been five and a half years since Sir Walter Scott was given the prohibited substance of cobalt before a jumps race at Coleraine, and over three years since the couple were found guilty.
During this time, countless horses have been beaten, forced over jumps and injured under Pateman’s saddle.
BUT FINALLY! jumps racing’s golden boy Steven Pateman and his partner in life and in training, Jess Barton, will serve their disqualification. However, after a drawn out legal process, VCAT has reduced the penalty from three years to just eleven months.
You can read our summary on the case background here.
For anyone particularly interested in the reasons VCAT have given for the significantly reduced disqualification you can read more here.
RACING ARE THEIR OWN JUDGE AND JURY
Both mares were used for racing then for breeding.
Both mares were suffering such neglect they were euthanised.
Penalty? Nothing.
Of note: The initial cruelty report on registered breeding mare Rock My Fuji alleged Robbie Laing failed to provide veterinary treatment after she endured a difficult foaling. Nothing about this was mentioned in the hearing report from the Victorian Racing Tribunal. When we asked why and also why there is no mention of Rock My Fuji being in foal in the studbook we were informed the VRT cannot “provide comments on the evidence or submissions that were put forward during a hearing.”
Also of note: the VRT report stated Laing was suffering a severe case of Covid-19 during the course of the neglect. Yet, we found a radio interview with Robbie Laing in the same period of the neglect talking about his good health, his current work with horses and his future plans. He also had at least one horse in training that was hitting the track during the period. Make of that what you will.
PETER V’LANDYS LOSES ABC DEFAMATION CASE
Good news!
It must be difficult to be exposed for being complicit in the horrendous slaughter of the very individual’s whose exploitation provides your very high pay cheque.
Racing NSW CEO Peter V’landys attempt to take down those who were brave enough to do actual journalism and challenge him, and the racing industry as a whole, failed.
No doubt if there were a choice, one would prefer to be treated “shabbily” over being exploited, abused, beaten, confined and then killed. Let’s not forget who the actual victims are here.
Another joyous plus…
“V’landys was ordered to pay the broadcaster’s legal costs”. Full article here. Ground breaking investigation here.
DID SOMEBODY SAY RAFFLE?
Roll Up! Roll Up! For the greatest raffle of all time.
Why? Because the prizes are ACE and all proceeds will go towards our efforts to end horse racing cruelty.
Tickets $5 each or three for $10 – available here.
Huge love and thanks to our raffle sponsors Mt Nebo Railway Carriage and Chalet, Serotonin Eatery, Vegan Perfection, Goodwill Wine, Melbourne Hunt Saboteurs, Vegan Style, Woking Amazing, Red Sparrow Pizza, Wombat Cafe, Gojé Yarraville, Bunnings Warehouse Australia
NB: As promised, those who purchased tickets at our last Nup to the Cup event, will be entered into this draw. Thanks for your patience.
PAST AND UPCOMING PROTESTS
Huge love and thanks to Animal Liberation Queensland for saying Nup to the Ipswich Cup and to Sunshine Coast locals, ALQ and Coast to Coast Animal Friends for joining us to protest Ladies Oaks Day and to say Nup to the Caloundra Cup. It was impossible for punters to avoid the reality of what it was they were supporting as they entered the course.
Protest: Ban Jumps Racing
August 27, 2023
Ballarat Turf Club, VIC
11am – 2pm
Dress: Smart casual at a minimum. Dress as if you are going to the races is even better.
Banners and posters will be provided.
Thank you for reading and remember… speak up, always!
Ladies Oaks Day Protest – Sunshine Coast
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