If March makes hares mad, April and the Grand National has a similar effect on politicians. This year brought two classic interventions from Zack Polanski, the leader of the Green Party, and Liz Saville-Roberts who leads Plaid Cymru MPs in Westminster.
Polanski thinks that: “We need to ban horse racing” and that “there’s something deeply wrong with society when this is considered a sport”. His position of faux ethical outrage is reminiscent of those who campaigned for a ban on hunting and lectured us about morality. Those who take that route need to be careful that they are not throwing stones in glass houses like many who have been down that road before.
Meanwhile, Saville-Roberts issued a bizarre statement on social media where she called for a debate about banning racing and claimed that “National Hunt racing doesn't feature in the Welsh rural economy”. Prejudice is one thing, but this exposed an extraordinary level of ignorance about the history of jump racing in Wales and its current status. Perhaps the most famous National Hunt jockey of all time, Dick Francis, was born and bred in Pembrokeshire before becoming champion jockey and a best-selling author. Dairy farmer Sirrell Griffiths made the trip from Carmarthenshire to Cheltenham in 1990 and pulled off the greatest shock in jump racing history by winning the Gold Cup with Norton’s Coin, the horse he trained on his farm, at 100-1. However, even their exploits have arguably been surpassed by the current generation of Welsh jockeys and trainers which were highlighted in December when Welsh trainer Rebecca Curtis legged up Welsh Champion Jockey Sean Bowen to win the Welsh Grand National at Chepstow on Haiti Couleurs, who was adding to his brilliant win in the Irish Grand National earlier in the year.
Wales has three thriving National Hunt racecourses, some brilliant National Hunt trainers and a generation of outstanding young jockeys who are making their mark in the toughest of games. To suggest that National Hunt racing does not feature in the Welsh rural economy is an insult both to those who work in the industry and the many thousands of Welsh people who love it.
Whilst it is tempting to write off these interventions as the ramblings of extremists, the political reality is that their parties could well be running the Welsh government in a few weeks time and the Greens have every chance of being part of a coalition government after the next Westminster election. Polls put Plaid Cymru in the lead in the Welsh election, which will be held on 7 May, but short of an overall majority. The Greens are predicted to win enough seats to potentially form a governing coalition with them.
Polanski and the Greens are probably beyond help as far as animal rights and rural issues are concerned, but Plaid is at its core a party of the countryside and many of its representatives will disagree profoundly with the attack on racing. The party will, however, have to tread extremely carefully after the election if the polls are correct. As has become increasingly clear in recent months, the Green Party is not green, it is fundamentally about culture war politics. If Plaid sells out the countryside for the price of Green votes it will not be forgiven.