A LEEDERVILLE florist is refusing to sell flowers for Melbourne Cup celebrations over animal cruelty concerns.

Veronika Muller announced the ban on The Posy Factory’s Facebook page in September, noting “122 horses died on Australian race tracks between August 2018 and July 2019”.

Now in her second year of business, Ms Muller says Cup Day is normally huge for florists, who sell arrangements for corporate gigs and flowers for cup day outfits. 

”It just wouldn’t sit right with me.

“There’s plenty of other things to make money out of,” Ms Muller told the Voice.

 “There is plenty of other occasions which don’t harm animals; which don’t harm something that can’t protect itself,” she says.

• Veronika Muller doesn’t want to profit off the cruelty of racehorses. Photo by Alex Murfett

Entertainment

“I just hate animal cruelty. Animals aren’t for entertainment.

“It’s not just that they die in the races … they die after the races, they go off and get slaughtered.”

The ABC’s current affairs program 7.30 exposed the brutal aftermath of the racing industry earlier this month, focussing on a Queensland abattoir which slaughtered racehorses.

Covert cameras caught abattoir staff kicking, beating and yelling at the former racehorses just before they were slaughtered.

Racing Australia responded to the report with a statement saying: “Racing Australia shares the outrage at the appalling images of the gross mistreatment of horses revealed in the program.”

by ALEX MURFETT