Greyhound Racing NSW (GRNSW) has today released its formal counterfactual response to the report published about the organisation by Dr Alex Brittan upon his departure from his role as Chief Veterinary Officer in 2023.
In the document, with evidence, GRNSW addresses and publicly rejects the key aspects of Brittan’s handover report, which contained a range of serious allegations and assertions concerning the organisation and the greyhound racing industry.
GRNSW's assessment is that many of these claims are unsupported, based on incomplete or misinterpreted information, or extend beyond Dr Brittan’s area of professional expertise.
Across the substantive matters raised, GRNSW has found that numerous claims are factually incorrect, based on misread data, unsupported by available evidence, or presented without sufficient foundation.
“Independent specialist veterinary counsel was sought in the review of the Brittan allegations, and as a result, they have been unsubstantiated,” Acting Chief Executive Officer Brian Charman said.
“The claims of Dr Brittan have gone publicly unchallenged until this point in time, yet have been repeatedly produced in media, and used as fact by anti-racing bodies whose sole aim is to discredit and ultimately see the industry closed.
“GRNSW has taken its time and been prudent and diligent in putting together the response to Dr Brittan’s report and it will paint a very different picture to the one which has been portrayed.”
Brittan only worked in his role at GRNW for eight months before producing his handover report following his abrupt departure in late 2023.
The overall assessment of the Brittan report was that it consistently demonstrates a misunderstanding of industry operations, misinterpretation of data, and conclusions drawn from insufficient scope of direct observation.
In multiple instances and independent inquiries his specific claims were examined and rejected and conclusions were reached without adequate evidence, data misread or misapplied, and serious allegations made without substantiation.
In its examination of Brittan’s claims, GRNSW also found that his recommendations on travel subsidies and racing frequency lacked a clear evidence base and independent veterinary expert opinion found no link between travel subsidies and racing injuries, in fact, expert veterinarians confirmed the subsidy actually provides animal welfare benefits.
Brittan alleged a rehoming backlog of 11,000–14,000 greyhounds without supporting evidence. This was deemed a gross exaggeration with the NSW industry regulator, the Greyhound Welfare & Integrity Commission’s (GWIC) own population modelling placing this figure at approximately 4,100, and in 2024-25 the industry rehomed more greyhound pets than greyhounds born.
Brittan also made conclusions about track surfaces and facilities which were based on visits to only three or four NSW tracks, making his sweeping assessments professionally unsound. His comparisons with UK injury data were also flawed due to significantly different racing conditions.
He also claimed that GWIC was under-reporting industry death rates, and that large numbers of greyhounds were "going missing." These were shown to be the result of his misreading and misapplication of data from the ETrac and Ozchase systems. GWIC's reporting was confirmed accurate.
The full counterfactual report can be found at https://www.grnsw.com.au/news/2026-07-28/counterfactual-response-brittan-report
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