The Advertising Standards Authority has dismissed a complaint against a welfare group, which claimed ‘Greyhound Racing KILLS’.

The advertising watchdog also ruled the group’s claim that ‘every licensed track has a freezer to store the dead dogs’ could be substantiated.

The Greyhound Board of Great Britain and Owlerton Greyhound Stadium challenged whether the claims made by Caged Nationwide were misleading and could be substantiated.

A digital outdoor poster for Caged Nationwide, a greyhound welfare pressure group, was seen in June 2022, showing an image of a muzzled greyhound. Large text alongside it stated, ‘Greyhound Racing KILLS’. Smaller text stated, ‘Every licensed track has a freezer to store the dead dogs’.

In response to the complaint to the ASA, Caged Nationwide cited the yearly figures published by the Greyhound Board of Great Britain (GBGB) for the number of greyhounds who retired from racing or who were injured or died while racing. They said the figures stated that 120 greyhounds were recorded as killed at British Greyhound tracks in 2021 and 200 in 2020. They said that, in addition, there would be greyhounds who were killed by euthanasia on economical grounds and in cases where they were not rehomable. However, Caged Nationwide doubted whether it was possible to obtain accurate figures on that. They said that once a greyhound was no longer registered to race, they were no longer traceable and their movement and existence was not monitored by GBGB or any other welfare body.

Caged Nationwide cited GBGB rule 110B which required that a vet attending a greyhound track had access either to a room or a mobile facility which had a freezer suitable for the storage of a greyhound carcass.

The ASA considered readers would interpret the claim to mean that greyhound racing itself was responsible for the death of greyhounds, rather than other external factors, and that deaths caused in this way were a common occurrence.

The data published by GBGB split the total number of registered racing greyhound deaths across several different reasons. The reasons included treatment costs; no home found; designated unsuitable for rehoming; put to sleep on vet’s advice away from track; put to sleep on humane grounds at track; sudden death and terminal illness/natural causes/other. Of the 359 that had died in 2021, 120 were in the category of being put to sleep on humane grounds at the track. That was the number and category that Caged Nationwide had cited to support their claim. In the same category, the figures for 2020, 2019 and 2018 were 200, 207 and 242 respectively.

The ASA considered that an animal which needed to be put to sleep on humane grounds at the track was likely to have suffered on-track injuries. 

The authority also considered that 120 track-related deaths in the last year, which equated to more than two deaths per week, meant that was a common occurrence. 

“We acknowledged that the use of the term ‘killed’ to refer to the way in which those greyhounds had died might be seen as distasteful and sensationalist by some and, in that sense, an emotive element to the situation,” the ASA said in its ruling.

“Nevertheless, we considered Caged Nationwide had shown there was a factual basis for the claim. We considered the way they had chosen to make the claim was unlikely to be considered more widely as misrepresentative of the situation.

“We therefore concluded that the claim ‘Greyhound racing KILLS’ had been substantiated and was not likely to mislead.”

With regard to the second point of the complaint, the ASA stated: “We considered readers would interpret the claim in its factual sense to mean that any licensed greyhound race track would have a freezer to store the corpses of greyhounds that had died there. 

“We understood the wider context that the sudden death of any greyhound needed to be investigated and that evidence needed to be preserved to increase knowledge and improve veterinary care. 

“We acknowledged therefore that the way that was highlighted in the ad might again be seen as distasteful and sensationalist by some and, in that sense, added an emotive element to the situation. 

“Nevertheless, we again considered Caged NW had shown there was a factual basis for the claim. We considered the way they had chosen to make the claim was unlikely to be considered more widely as misrepresentative of the situation.

“We therefore concluded that the claim ‘Every licensed track has a freezer to store the dead dogs’ had been substantiated and was not likely to mislead.”