MAYO TD Michael Ring has expressed his disappointment at ongoing rows within the horse sport industry, taking aim at those in positions of power, who “don’t know a horse from a bull”.

Speaking at a joint committee meeting on Agriculture, Food and the Marine in Dáil Eireann on Wednesday, he said: “I’m very disappointed, 12 years on the same disputes are going on, the same troubles, the same rows... that’s why we’re at where we’re at in relation to the Olympics. In relation to the board, every board now has been taken over by former county managers, former assistant secretaries, former civil servants and we’re doing nothing about it.

“They won’t put on people that actually know something about it, yet we have civil servants, who don’t know a horse from a bull, and that’s the truth, and they’re coming in then, telling the professionals and the people that are involved in the sport, how to run their sport.”

Mr Ring said it was time to bring in the Department of Agriculture to discuss the make up of Horse Sport Ireland’s (HSI) board in particular.

“There is not a democratic board elected there. It’s a piecemeal board that doesn’t represent anybody. In the GAA, or the soccer or the rugby, if you didn’t have people from the ground up that knew something about (that sport), there’s no point having them on the board. You have to have people on the board that understand the profession. So I’ll ask the question, what can we do to bring everybody together? We have the situation where all the different groupings here (HSI affiliates) haven’t representation on the board. Something has to be done, because the loser in this is the industry, and it’s a very important industry. It’s worth €1 billion to this country. Why would we let an industry like that fall apart?”

Response

Responding to Deputy Ring was ShowJumping Ireland representative Ronan Corrigan, who said: “Our biggest concern has been that the new constitution of HSI is designed to effectively protect HSI’s existence, and it isn’t accountable to the affiliates. It’s accountable to its own members, and the only members it has are its board. So how do we fix it? We need you to help us put something in place that will serve the sports and the industry.

“You perceive us to be in a power struggle with HSI. We’re not in a power struggle with HSI. We are trying to give HSI a kick in the ass, to actually realise we want to look after our sport and our industry. We are all passionate about it.

“When HSI came into existence, it was a terrific idea. It was an umbrella body. It was going to find funding for sport and breeding and grow both. They did for a while. Unfortunately, they started to deviate and forgot what it was meant to do. This thing needs a mallet to land on top of it and say the industry needs to be supported. We need all of you (politicians) to drop that mallet on the table and say enough is enough. It’s not about the people on the board, I’m sure they’re very competent people, but you’re right in saying some of them have very little practical knowledge of what’s wanted, and that has to change.

“Put the people who have the best interests of the sport and the industry in places that they can influence and do things properly. That’s all we want. And transparency, that’s the most important thing. There is huge state funding coming into this, and every single person should be able to see a set of accounts that shows what the last penny was spent on.”