The Minister for Culture & Heritage, Josepha Madigan, is currently considering if she will grant a hare netting licence to the coursers for another season of barbarism. We believe the Minister should refuse this licence not only because of the cruelty inflicted on the hares, but also because of the revelations in the RTE Investigates programme concerning alleged illegal coursing, which were defended by the Irish Coursing Club CEO DJ Histon in an extraordinary statement to the Joint Agriculture Committee on July 9.
DJ Histon claimed to the Committee that the hare hunting shown in the RTE Investigates programme was engaged in by a club called Bantry. He further claimed that this so-called Bantry club, which never appeared on any coursing fixture list published on the ICC website, or in the schedule attached to the hare netting licence, was an "Associative" club. (Every coursing club, whether open or closed, appears on the schedule attached to the hare netting licence, but Bantry was never listed, nor were the 18 other such clubs mentioned by Histon).
If it's true that there is such a club called Bantry, it is indeed strange that when RTE Investigates contacted the ICC for a reaction to the hare hunting on Whiddy Island, they were told that they (ICC) were "unaware of unauthorised coursing meetings as described", while the individuals who took part in the alleged illegal activity refused to comment, apart from one individual, who said he believed he had "done nothing wrong". So it begs the question, why didn't the ICC and the Whiddy Island hare coursers swiftly respond to RTE to clear up the matter there and then, and why did it take ICC CEO DJ Histon two weeks to offer the Bantry "Associative" club explanation?
In the RTE footage of hare hunting on Whiddy Island, the coursers were seen using terriers to flush hares out of cover, a new element to coursing, which does not happen in so-called "legal" coursing, nor does coursing take place in the same location three weekends in a row.
Last year the licence to net timid, defenceless hares from the wild for use as live bait for greyhounds was signed on August 7th, effective from August 10th.
Please urgently ask Minister Madigan to refuse a 2019-2020 licence. It's time to bring this sordid "sport" to an end for the sake of the hares and the greyhounds, who suffer the same fate as track greyhounds.
Among the victims of hare coursing last season were a hare who suffered a “broken leg” and was euthanised by vet, a hare “hit several times and mauled by the greyhound”, a hare who “dropped dead while being boxed at release”, a hare who died from injuries after being pinned to the ground by dogs, a hare who died after colliding with another hare, a hare “found dead in escape” and a hare who was “hit twice on the legs by the dogs”. Read our "Coursing Cruelty Catalogue 2018-19" at https://www.facebook.com/banbloodsports/photos/a.463548137094083/2260126687436210/?type=3&theater
URGENT ACTION ALERT
Contact the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, Josepha Madigan, and urge her not to issue a licence for another season of cruel hare coursing.
Email "Stop the cruelty. Stop licensing cruel coursing" to
josepha.madigan@oireachtas.ie or
Phone: +353 (0)1 631 3800
Leave a comment on Facebook: https://facebook.com/JosephaMadiganFG
Tweet to: @josephamadigan
Sign the petition: IRELAND BAN CRUEL HARE COURSING
www.change.org/p/ireland-ban-cruel-hare-coursing
Watch the full “RTE Investigates Greyhounds Running for Their Lives” programme on the RTE Player
https://www.rte.ie/player/movie/rt%C3%A9-investigates-greyhounds-running-for-their-lives/104051751967
or on Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYTb2qBjlMM