The stewards chose to accept the tracks explanations regarding the incident and no further action has been taken against the track. See following letter regarding the inquiry from Kathryn Knight who was present. Portsmouth Inquiry

The hearing of the "O'malley Shez incident at Portsmouth earlier in the year will be heard at the NGRC Offices on Thursday 15th August.

Hove Update

Many of you will already have read the articles published in the R. Post over the last couple of days with reference to the "pulling", of our promised interview by Dave Lawrence after Jarvis Astaire's intervention.

Here is an account from our Vice-Chairman of the events leading up to the meeting.

"A factual account as I see it of the issues UGO had, I would like to thank all those UGO members who gave up there time to deal with the problems we encountered."

27 May - I contacted Hove Stadium and was provided by e-mail details of the sponsorship packages available.

29th May - I made a verbal contract with Hove, which was confirmed by e-mail that evening. Part of my verbal agreement was for the 695m race that was not the Maiden, this was considered no problem by the Lady I spoke to as none of the races had been specifically taken.

30th May - I received written confirmation from Hove of the details agreed, together with details of when information was required from UGO such as race title, graphics for advertising and programme advertisement.

UGO complied with all deadlines set by Hove.

7th June - I was contacted by Stuart Walton (Hove General Manager) who advised me they were withdrawing UGO’s sponsorship as they felt there was a conflict of interest between ourselves and the Brighton Greyhound Owners Association. Mr Walton confirmed Hove would pay our reasonable costs between 29th May and 7th June.

As we were not happy with this UGO went up the managerial chain at Coral Stadia to Bill Hiscock, at this point we were given a different reason for withdrawal, that content of our constitution was not acceptable in the race card advert. We agreed to withdraw the constitution, Mr Hiscock was still concerned at his perception that we are a “militant” group.

10 June - Having failed to identify what action we had taken or suggested that was militant, Mr Hiscock relented and allowed our sponsorship

14 June - We contacted Sky Sports who agreed to consider an interview, they were sent details of UGO and our Constitution and told they could ask anything they wished of us.

15 June - We were advised by members in the Brighton area, that we had been allocated the Maiden race at 19:40, that evening one of our Committee approached Stuart Walton to express our disgust and try and change our race to one of the Bitches races as we had secured an additional prize of a free mating to Crack Off.

17 June – Sky Sports confirmed a 2.5 minute Interview with Geoff Stelling at 20:06

18 June – Shortly before 7pm we were approached by Sky and advised our Interview had been pulled. We were told we may be offered an Interview at a later date where we could ask questions of Jarvis, but that we would have to submit our questions in advance.

Tim Gardner

SKY Sponsored race.

Hove Auction

Sky Race 

We are delighted to announce that we have now secured sponsorship of a race to be televised on SKY.

The meeting takes place on the 18 June 2002 at Corals Hove Stadium and is the finals night of the Eurobet Stayers, the meeting has already attracted some of the top stayers in the country as well as some of their Irish counterparts.

Since we are sponsoring a 695m race we may have some top names in the race if they get knocked out in early rounds.

We are hopeful that this sponsorship can raise the profile of UGO by reaching a wide audience via the press and SKY, the cost includes a banner (8m x 1m) to be hung at the track and displayed for six months after the meeting, along with the usual advertising within the race programme. 

Thanks to all those who made this possible by donating to the sponsor fund.

We look forward to meeting as many as possible on the night.

PRESS RELEASE 

The Union of Greyhound Owners has today requested a Formal Inquiry by the National Greyhound Racing Club into Unnecessary Cruelty suffered by the greyhound Omalleys Shez during a race at Portsmouth Greyhound Stadium on 19^th April 2002. 

The video recording of the race shows the greyhound in trap 2 Omalleys Shez sadly breaking its leg at the first bend of a 610m open race. 

Despite tannoy announcements the hare is not stopped and is brought back round and run past the stricken dog who proceeds to chase the hare, in the view of the Union of Greyhound Owners such action was both cruelty and unnecessary, it is accepted that this was not a deliberate act but a failure of proper procedures to be in place. 

Mr Simon Adams the track vet at Portsmouth Stadium has confirmed that Omalleys Shez was sadly put to sleep as a result of the injuries sustained during the race in question. 

The injuries sustained to Omalleys Shez at the first bend of the race in question may have led to his necessary euthanasia, however the failure to stop the hare would not have helped his injury and may have been a contributing factor.

A video of the race may be made available.

UGO is aiming to sponsor a race on Sky in the forthcoming months, in order to raise awareness of the 'Union'.

This will entitle us to free advertising in all the race programmes, choice of 'celebrity' to award the trophy to the winning greyhound & it's owner.

We can hopefully secure a pre race interview with Dave Lawrence also to promote our cause & entice further membership.

It may also be possible to persuade the Racing Post to include a small article on the day with possibly the printing of membership forms also.

In order for this to take place we are requesting that members & as yet non-members also donate to the kitty for this purpose only, in the event it does not take place for any reason then all monies will be returned unless requested otherwise.

David Miles has pledged to match 'pound for pound', if we can raise £1000, so we are keen to see him part with his money

Please send donations to: UGO. 29 Highcliffe Road, GRANTHAM. Lincs. NG31 8DS

Cheques Payable to UGO please. Write 'SKY Sponsorship' on reverse.

Ugo Do Good aged 5 months!

UGO has been approached, to provide a report to the Home Office on the subject of "What is wrong with greyhound racing?" They are looking at the sport with a view to possible Govt intervention!
I am sure we should find enough information to fill a small book! Lets have your ideas, thoughts etc. We need to put forward hard evidence if we are to convince the Govt that change is essential. We have the advantage over Civil Servants in that we are on the inside of the sport and our input will be invaluable to them. This is a BIG project. We need you all to contribute. I know you all have your own ideas on what needs changing and how to change it. Help us put forward the definitive document on the state of the sport today! Please email you comments by clicking here, 'Home Office Survey' GO FOR IT!!

This is the latest Photo of the Pup (Thorgil Tex x Clonross Millie) donated to UGO at 10 wks old! We hope to have more available soon. 

In the meantime we are holding a competition to give him a name. (Now Closed, no further entries please). We have two prizes up for grabs for the winner a copy of the book "Care of the Racing Greyhound" & for the runner-up a years subscription of the "Greyhound Monthly".  Once we have collated any that we receive from our members who are not online we will have a Judge, Charlie Lister has kindly accepted to take on this role on our behalf, to decide who the winners are. Judges decision is final!!

Please note change of plan, we have decided not to list the suggestions until after we have checked the winning names are available, I think the reason may be obvious!

I have seen many top suggestions so far, so Charlie will have a difficult job on his hands.

We Have been approached by Clarissa Baldwin, from the 'National Canine Defence League', who ask's if we would be interested in joining the Greyhound Forum?  Other members include people such as Denis Beary, President of Society of Greyhound Veterinarians and Lord Lipsey, soon to be a trustee of the RGT. We would appreciate members views about this, their website is located at www.ncdl.org.uk , their site although very informative is not the easiest to navigate & the link to the Greyhound Forum is thus www.ncdl.org.uk/index.cfm?contid=268
Our initial thoughts are that  this may be a very useful association, however we value the opinion of our members (or non-members), please tell us what you think about this so that we may make the correct decisions about such associations with other bodies such as this. Mail Us