Animal Aid

Most people regard horse racing as a harmless sport in which the animals are willing participants who thoroughly enjoy the thrill. The truth is that, behind the scenes, lies a story of immense suffering.

Approximately 18,000 foals are born into the closely-related British and Irish racing industries each year, yet only around 40% go on to become racers. Those horses who do not make the grade may be slaughtered for meat or repeatedly change hands in a downward spiral of neglect. Of those horses who do go on to race, around 400 are raced to death every year.

Beneath its glamorous façade, commercial horse racing is a ruthless industry motivated by financial gain and prestige. Cruelty? You can bet on it!

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Horse Racing Awareness Week

Horse Racing Awareness Week takes place in the seven days leading up to the Grand National meeting in Aintree - a notoriously hazardous three-day event that has killed 35 horses over the last decade.

Read more about Horse Racing Awareness Week

Ban the Whip

Using pain in an effort to control an animal is morally repugnant to anyone with respect for animals. The evidence shows, in any case, that such violence is counter-productive in terms of safety and in producing winners.

Read more about our 'ban the whip' campaign

Great Leighs Racecourse: First Horse Death on Third Day of Racing (15-05-2008)

Devastating assault on racing cruelty by top Fleet Street writer (14-04-2008)

Tell the BBC that the Death of McKelvey Was Avoidable (09-04-2008)

BBC1 ‘STAR’ HORSE KILLED AT THE GRAND NATIONAL (05-04-2008)

Grand National Meeting Kills Two More Horses (04-04-2008)

Spectre of Death Visits Ludlow Racecourse (04-04-2008)

As racing goes into crisis talks over jockeys’ behaviour ... WHIP USE AT AINTREE UNDER THE SPOTLIGHT (31-03-2008)

UK-wide protests against the Grand National (28-03-2008)

Britain’s Most Lethal Course Claims Another Victim (26-03-2008)

Spectre of Death Visits Britain's Most Lethal Racecourse (25-03-2008)

Full Campaign News Archive