Horsing groups seeking common ground

Chairman of the Traditional Irish Horse Association (TIHA) Hugh Leonard will adopt a collegiate approach when a delegation from the association meets Horse Sport Ireland representatives today.

In doing so, he is distancing himself from a hard-hitting letter sent by one of TIHA’s founding members, John Watson, to Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney on Jan 25, which was critical of the HSI/Teagasc/RDS strategic report to be published by the minister next Tuesday.

The letter took issue with a perceived diminution of the importance of the traditional Irish horse (TIH) in favour of a concentration on the production of high-class show jumping and eventing horses, saying: “It is especially feared by TIH breeders that the [strategic] plan will reduce the status and perception (not to mention value) of the TIH from being the high-performance breed it actually is, to being an animal simply hobby-bred for leisure use alone.”