Two animal welfare groups are demanding immediate Government action following the deaths of three greyhounds in just three days.
On June 11, Homebush Sydney suffered a spiral fracture to her left femur during a race at Ascot Park Raceway in Southland. The injury was so severe she was euthanised, SAFE said.
Two days later, Homebush Feijoa collapsed and died at the lure at Addington Raceway in Christchurch. The cause of death is still unknown.
That same day, Midnight Brockie sustained catastrophic fractures to her right hock and tibia at Hatrick Raceway in Whanganui and was also euthanised.
The latest deaths bring the total number of greyhound fatalities this racing season to 16, already surpassing last year’s toll of 13, with six weeks still remaining.
SAFE Campaigns Manager Emma Brodie said the deaths were not isolated incidents, but a “damning indictment of an industry that treats these animals as expendable.”
“Three dogs in three days is not just a tragedy. Behind every number is a dog who felt pain, fear, and suffering in their final moments. That should shake us to our core,” she said.
The fatalities come as Greyhound Racing New Zealand (GRNZ) challenges the Government’s decision to ban the sport, filing High Court proceedings in an effort to delay the ban.
“GRNZ is dragging the Government through the courts while greyhounds are dying on their watch,” Brodie said. “But the court of public opinion has already delivered its verdict: this cruelty has to stop.”
SAFE is urging the Government to follow through with its promise to ban greyhound racing and begin the process of winding down the industry, while working with rehoming groups to ensure dogs are safely transitioned out of racing.
“Every dog still in this system is a life at risk,” Brodie said. “We need the Government to step in now to give these dogs a fighting chance at life beyond the track.”
Greyhound Protection League of New Zealand spokeswoman Emily Robertson said, “This is not reform. This is carnage.”
“Three dogs dead in three days of racing, and still this industry has the audacity to challenge the Government’s decision to shut it down. It’s beyond belief.”
Midnight Brockie, just three years old, had raced 49 times and earned $45,470 in prize money before her death. She was the littermate of Brockie’s Rocket, another greyhound who collapsed and died at the lure in Manukau in September 2024.
“Greyhounds collapsing and dying at the end of their race, sometimes even after winning, is a particularly alarming new trend that has emerged over the past two seasons,” Robertson said.
“In the 2023/24 racing season, three dogs died this way. So far in the 2024/25 season, that number has doubled, with six greyhounds collapsing and dying at the lure, including three from Canterbury kennels.”
While Greyhound Racing New Zealand did not respond to a request for comment on the deaths, the organisation released a press statement on Monday focused on protecting its $16 million savings fund.
GRNZ said any move by the Government to requisition the fund would be “contemptible,” calling it money “rightly owned by the sport and its participants.”
Chief Executive Edward Rennell claimed the Government would “execute the sport on trumped up charges, and make us pay for the gallows and grave.”
He accused the Government of creating a “low point” in New Zealand legal history, saying “this is the first Government to fabricate a new law to close an Incorporated Society that is totally compliant with all laws and standards.”
Rennell said the funds should not be used for rehoming costs, arguing the Government’s own ban had created those costs through its insistence on a fast shutdown.
He said any ban should be “cost-neutral” and allow the industry to manage its own wind-down, using profits and savings on its own terms.
“The Government is grinding its heel into our people by taking their money as well as their sport,” he said. “Those funds were built up over decades by generations of sport participants. It belongs to them.”
