Letters to the editor

I sent a message via their website requesting the same – unanswered to date.

After countless phone calls, with the message “we are experiencing a greater than expected work load, your call will not be accepted, please call again”, I finally got through to be advised I needed to give my postcode.

OK. Then the suburb I live in.

I advised I lived in a country town - Cootamundra - only to be asked again, “yes but what suburb”. Finally got through.

Lastly what was my street address, Gundagai Road, to be told that street does not exist, can't help you, your enquiry will be elevated to a higher level. 

As yet still no reply.

David Hancox, Cootamundra

Mr Baird, are you mad? Do you have any idea what you have done to the greyhound industry? No, probably not as you've never left Sydney I'd bet.

We only live in a small country town but the greyhound track here injects a massive $250,000  a year into the town through wages, part-time jobs, food and vet assisstance. Where are you going to recoup that extra money from? What else are you going to do to stuff up the state?

That report you supposedly read to ban the greyhound industry was from America. Do you think all of us average people are stupid. How about you do your own homework and get the real facts from the country you live in. If you want to use American facts to suit your own agenda why not move there.

Your supposed animal welfare program that’s full of baloney as well. Do you really believe that there are 200,000 people out there that are going to adopt every greyhound? We all know that your welfare program is just fancy words for killing all the greyhounds humanely.

Oh and then there’s the program that your going to send them overseas to animal-friendly countries to sit in quarantine for six months. Who's paying for this? Is it coming out of your pocket or is the RSPCA getting a kickback from the Baird government to pay for all the extra food, quarantine and the cost of euthanasia? The RSPCA can’t cope now with what they have.

Do you not realise it takes two to three years to get a greyhound to the race track. In that time they become pets, your friends, your family. Some people just live for there greyhounds – you take that away and you’re asking for trouble.

I know for a fact that quite a few people who own greyhounds and race them have rang directors of greyhound tracks telling them they’re going to kill all their animals and then themselves. These deaths are on your head. You want to make stupid decisions, you suffer the consequences all by yourself.

It's not like the greyhounds are underfed or malnourished, they are usually better fed than most of the owners. How would you feel if the prime minister announced no more pets ever and the first pets to go are yours and that of your families?

Do you realise you’re wiping out an entire species? Do you know how long greyhound racing has been going on? The first race was in England in 1876 and then turned professional in 1912 in California. Over 100 years of racing and you want it to stop because you don’t believe it’s humane.

In every sport you will find cheats – people who do the wrong thing for what they believe is the right reason. Well you've started with the greyhounds, next better be NRL and AFL because they’re always doing the wrong thing but you don’t penalise them.

I'd bet you wouldn't even accept a dare to actually come here and see our track and meet some of the people involved. You know why I know this? Because you’re scared and you don’t want to get that suit or your hands dirty and own up and face the people that your god awful decisions affect.

Sandra Kelly, Temora