They have devoted over 50 years to a sport that this week has been banned

Before he died in December last year, Malcolm Tams dedicated more than 50 years of his life to greyhound racing. The 70-year-old from Blackwood was introduced to the sport at the age of 18 by his uncle, who always kept racing dogs when Malcolm was growing up.

From the very first moments, Malcolm was hooked, and his love for these animals compelled him to make a career in the racing industry. His grandson Joe said he devoted his every waking moment to the sport until the day he took his last breath.

Valleys Greyhounds, in Hengoed, is the last greyhound racing track in Wales. Malcom took over the track in 2008.

Malcolm sold the track in 2021 to Dave Barclay, but continued to manage the track like it was his own until his death. His family hoped to carry on his legacy and to honour Malcom’s love for the sport.

This will no longer be possible. On March 17, the Senedd voted in favour of a ban on the sport. The ban was agreed as part of a deal with sole Liberal Democrat Senedd member Jane Dodds so the Labour government could pass its budget for 2025-26. Ms Dodds, a greyhound owner, has been a vocal advocate of a ban.

Malcom’s grandson Joe Tams, 21, has described this decision as “devastating” for his family and their community, and questioned whether the incentives behind the decision were for the good of Welsh communities and Welsh people, or instead for politicians personal agendas’. Stay in the know by making sure you’re receiving our daily newsletter

Joe said: “The majority of the ministers that voted for the ban, have never even been to the track. They have probably never interacted with a greyhound, to be honest. For me, the ban had already been decided as soon as a proposal was announced, serving Jane Dodd’s personal agenda as opposed to the actual views of Welsh communities.

“We are the only Greyhound racing group in the country yet to this day we still have never been contacted by the Welsh government at any point in their process.

“A lot of the facts they have stated as part of their research behind this decision are questionable, such as the petition from Hope Rescue, where half of the signatures came from outside of the UK, and from other charities that have inflated figures without being challenged.

“I can’t understand how you could ban something without engaging with the very thing you are banning. You should not be able to vote to ban something you do not understand.

“For our family, it is devastating really. Obviously this has been my grandfather’s track for 20 odd years. He brought me up here and everyone at the track helped to bring me up. He spent pretty much every waking moment here until he fell ill at the track.

“We assumed that the Welsh government would contact us to speak to our trainers, and see what exactly they do, and how well our dogs are looked after. My advice for them would be to actually interact with the communities that they’ve targeted.

“As things stand, all of our trainers could be out of a job within a year. We still have absolutely no idea what that means, how that’ll be funded, and how all the racing hounds will be rehomed, as looking after them is a full time job that needs to be paid for. They need to be fed, warm, looked after.

“This will affect 100s of people just in Wales. For our track, we have 10 to 15 staff at the track, 10 trainers, all who will have a couple of staff themselves, and then you’ve got, obviously, the punters and the regulars who’ve been coming to the track their whole lives.”

WalesOnline visited the track previously in March 2025, almost exactly a year ago. While there we spoke to Malcolm Tams before his death.

Malcolm said the Valley, which has been in Ystrad Mynach since 1975, should be compensated sufficiently before anyone walks away. “I sold this for a million in 2022 but I’m still here everyday making sure everything is perfect and making sure future development is going on here.

“We had planning permission to build a community hub here for people to come and have a cup of tea and coffee. But we’ve not been able to build that because of all this hanging over us in terms of the future of the sport.

“In 2010 I went down to the Senedd and had meetings with them and we came out with a paper called The Better Bet for Greyhounds. We all signed it and 100% of what was in that paper has been carried out.”

He said a ban won’t stop greyhound racing in Wales. “It’ll go back to what they used to call flip meetings and they’ll be racing in farmers’ fields. It’d go underground.”

We also spoke to others like Mark Gibson, who has been coming here for 40 years.

“It’s a release,” he says. “To get away from your mundane life. The adrenaline you get from watching the dogs is second to none.

“Once you get into it I suppose it is, to use an old cliche, a bit of a drug. It’s the thrill of the chase isn’t it? I got out of the game for a bit but this track opened on my doorstep and I was hooked again. Now I’ve got three greyhounds. My grandchildren love it too. They’ll tell you everything about the dogs and their form. It’s good for their maths.”

Vet Simon was checking over a young bitch named How’s My Ria who has a problem with her toe when we he told us what he thought.

“I’m not against greyhound racing at all,” he says. “You’ve got an athlete there and it’s what they’re bred to do. They are absolutely fine-tuned to do it.

“Everything about a greyhound is about speed. You’ve got a nice deep chest with big lungs and a big heart. You’ve got a slim-lined body even to the point their ears are folded back against their head. They’re really impressive animals. Without a doubt most of them enjoy it. Those that don’t enjoy it don’t tend to stay racing.

“I think the ban is rather inappropriate. It’s clearly political. I’m not sure it’s actually that much of a contentious or divisive issue in Wales. I don’t see exactly why they want to ban it because I don’t see lots of people rushing to the Senedd calling for this. It’s the sort of thing that weeks later people will have forgotten about so to me it’s an odd one.

“It is difficult to eliminate all injuries but they do get them and there are occasionally freak incidents like if two dogs collide. But the things we can do, like making sure they’re fully fit prior to racing and making sure the track is in perfect condition, are all covered.”

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Plumber Marcus May, who is a trainer and has three of his five dogs racing, has been travelling from Neath to Ystrad Mynach to race his dogs since the Swansea track closed in 2009. Prior to that he raced his dogs at Skewen which closed in 1993.

“It’s been in my life since I was six,” he says. “It’s been my family’s life. I don’t know what I’d do without it to be honest. My father who got me into greyhounds died when I was 21 and then my brother died in 2016. After that I’ve suffered from depression and training the dogs has helped me through it massively. Without this I do worry how I’d be.

“The problem is we’ve all been tarred with the same brush. I’ve always looked after my animals – they mean everything to me and they’re part of the family. They’re not just machines. I’ve got a dog who has hurt his wrist – he’s not broken his wrist but he’s been off since September. It’s not about money. I earn enough plumbing. It’s the love of the dogs and a love of the sport.”

Back to the here and now Joe Tams says he wished people could “come and see what we actually do.”

“On a race day, every dog is checked over by a vet before it races. Every dog is weighed, to make sure it’s healthy. Beforehand, they are kept in air conditioned kennels, then they race for maximum of 30 seconds.

“Back off the track, they get washed down by their owners or trainers, checked by the vet again, and then put back into the kennels for a minimum of 15 more minutes to make sure they are all good to go – and they’re always completely healthy after racing.

“There’s no way to force a greyhound to run. You put them in the traps, the traps open, they run. It is completely unlike horse racing, where you’ve got a jockey sat on a horse, whipping it. The dogs are doing it off their own back.

“They’re told to go, but they don’t have to go, obviously. We often have dogs who decide on the day they don’t fancy it. We also have retired racing dogs that return to the track for open days and things with their families that hear the starter and want nothing more than to go onto the track to chase it.

Joe explained that when the dogs are not racing, they are usually with their trainers or families walking and keeping fit.

Joe said that all ministers who had visited the track for themselves before the final phases of the banning process voted against the ban, apart from Lindsay Whittle.

“He reassured us that he found no issues, and reassured the trainers that there was nothing wrong with racing, and then voted for the ban. Which was very disappointing. Just before the Caerphilly by-election.

“He reassured everybody on this side, and then once he won the by election, just stabbed us in the back.”

In a statement, the Welsh Government said: “A transition period to allow the industry to wind down responsibly, strengthen rehoming arrangements for retired greyhounds, and prepare enforcement bodies and local authorities for the change which will see the prohibition brought into effect between 1 April 2027 and 1 April 2030.

“The Bill reflects a clear policy choice: that the injuries, fatalities, and poor post-racing outcomes associated with greyhound racing can no longer be justified. Despite efforts within the industry, harm to greyhounds has remained a consistent reality.”

Opponents of the law pursued a judicial review of it. The Greyhound Board of Great Britain’s (GBGB) case was that appropriate consultation was not undertaken prior to the decision to ban, and that the decision and introduction of the bill was therefore unlawful.

Though on March 20, the High Court dismissed the GBGB’s judicial review challenging the Welsh government’s plan to ban greyhound racing, confirming that the legislative process, passed in the Senedd on March 17, 2026, was lawful. This decision solidifies the upcoming ban, which will gradually wind down the sport by 2030.

The latest available statistics for Greyhound racing in the UK are from 2024. They show that the total greyhound runs amounted to 355,682 and the total deaths following these races were 123, equating to 0.03%.

Joe Tams hopes that further research into the sport will be conducted, and the decision be overturned for the sake of his family, friends and fellow staff.

The TV host was rumoured to be in talks with producers to join the hit BBC reality gameshow following the success of its first celebrity spin-off series.

This comes after it was rumoured that Hammond would appear in Netflix’s Bridgerton season 5.

🚨 THREE people may be hosting #Strictly , with 2 of the following:

Emma Willis
Zoe Ball
Alison Hammond
Alex Jones
Fleur East
Angela Scanlon
Mel Giedroyc

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AND 1 of:

Rylan
Bradley Walsh
Johannes Radebe

reportedly being combined to form a trio!
Screen tests start in April. pic.twitter.com/2lvplYxy9Y

— sᴜᴘᴇʀ ᴛᴠ (@superTV247) March 15, 2026

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Speaking at a Q&A with series four leads Yerin Ha and Luke Thompson, Alison teased to an audience full of fans: “You won’t know this yet, but we’ve just been speaking, and apparently there’s a new character!”

Will Alison Hammond appear on Celebrity Traitors?

But, speaking on ITV’s The Jonathan Ross Show, the 51-year-old said: “I can’t do it because I’m doing Bake Off.

“I think it’s the same time when I’m doing Bake Off, so that’s a definite no.”

Set in the Highlands and hosted by Claudia Winkleman, The Traitors follows a group of 22 contestants – the majority of whom are known as faithfuls – as they try to seek out the murderous traitors among them who kill off players in the middle of the night in an attempt to win a cash prize.

Following the success of the civilian version of the show, the BBC launched its first celebrity spin-off series last autumn, which featured a star-studded cast including Sir Stephen Fry, Jonathan Ross and Paloma Faith.

Alison Hammond joins #GBBO tonight.

Here is the time she was a contestant and thought that her oven doors had gone missing. Icon. pic.twitter.com/32fYIMKnDX

— Scott Bryan (@scottygb) September 26, 2023

The series brought in an average audience of 14.9 million people during its run – the biggest TV audience of 2025.

Hammond continued: “I’m so sorry, I would love to do that.

“I wouldn’t want to be a traitor though, I’d want to be a faithful. I don’t want no stress.”

Instead, Hammond will be fronting the popular Channel 4 baking show alongside comedian Noel Fielding and TV cook Paul Hollywood as a judge.

The trio will welcome cookbook author Nigella Lawson to the show, who joins the judging panel following Dame Prue Leith’s departure from the role.

Speaking about Dame Prue leaving, Hammond said: “It’s kind of bittersweet. We love Prue.

“She’s incredible – she’s given nine years of her time, but we also want her to go and enjoy life as well.

“I think she’s 86 now. She’s got a wonderful husband and they want to do more things.

“When you’re doing Bake Off, your summer’s gone, literally.

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“It’s very bitter that she’s going, but we’re very excited that we’ve got Nigella Lawson. I can’t wait – I’m actually meeting her next week. We’re going to have a coffee and a little chat. She’s really excited.”

The TV cook announced in January that she was stepping down as a judge after fronting it since 2017, a decision she said came from a desire to “work less and play more”.

The Jonathan Ross Show airs on Saturday at 10pm on ITV1 and ITVX.

He will be joined by: Dr Anna Keay, member of the Queen Elizabeth Memorial Committee and director of the Landmark Trust; St Andrews modern history Professor Chandrika Kaul; retired Lieutenant Colonel Johnny Stewart; Leonie Bell, director of V&A Dundee; Anne Lyden, director general of the National Galleries of Scotland; and Helen Webster, deputy director for cabinet, parliament and governance and secretary for commissions at the Scottish Government.

HAVANA (AP) — Cuba’s power grid collapsed Saturday leaving the country without electricity for a third time in March as the communist government battles with a decaying infrastructure and a U.S.-imposed oil blockade.

The state-owned Cuban Electric Union reported a total blackout across the island without giving a cause for the outage.

Authorities said they were working to restore power.

Power outages, whether nationwide or regional, have become relatively common in the last two years due to breakdowns in the aging infrastructure. The breakdowns are compounded by daily blackouts of up to 12 hours caused by fuel shortages, which also destabilize the system.

The last nationwide blackout occurred on Monday. Saturday’s outage was the second in the past week and the third in March.

The blackouts have a significant impact on the population, whose lives are disrupted by reduced work hours, lack of electricity for cooking, and food spoilage when refrigerators stop working, among many other consequences.

President Miguel Díaz-Canel has said the island has not received oil from foreign suppliers for three months. Cuba produces barely 40% of the fuel it needs to power its economy.

Cuba’s aging grid has drastically eroded in recent years. But the government also has blamed the outages on a U.S. energy blockade after U.S. President Donald Trump in January warned of tariffs on any country that sells or provides oil to Cuba. The Trump administration is demanding that Cuba release political prisoners and move toward political and economic liberalization in return for a lifting of sanctions. Trump also has raised the possibility of a “friendly takeover of Cuba.”

It’s also been named as one of the best places in Britain to eat noodles

After a long and stressful day at work, many people will reach for their favourite comfort food for a quick mood booster. Noodles are a popular option thanks to their versatility, how easy they are to make, and how warming they are when drenched in a cosy broth.

In Chinese culture, long noodles symbolise longevity and are an essential dish to have for celebrations such as New Year and birthdays. Cambridge is lucky to have plenty of restaurants serving up a range of noodles that are tasty enough to soothe any issue you might be facing.

The CamBites series sees our reporters going around Cambridgeshire in search of the best food that doesn’t cost a lot of money. The Two Treasure Hand Pulled Noodle Bar caught my eye, not only because it was named one of the best places to get noodles in Britain by The Observer, but also because you can watch the noodles being made.

I visited the noodle bar on a Tuesday at lunchtime with a friend expecting it to be fairly empty. However, when we arrived, the restaurant was absolutely packed with solo diners and groups of friends enjoying steaming bowls of noodles.

You order before finding a table so there were lots of people huddled around the short but inviting menu. While queuing to order, you can watch the chefs hard at work making the hand pulled noodles right in front of you with an incredible ease.

I decided to try the pickled cabbage beef brisket ramen, which cost £13.80, and my friend went for the garlic chilli oil beef brisket ramen, which cost £12.80. We were pointed to a cosy little table right next to the kitchen and waited for our noodles to appear.

Before long, my steaming bowl of noodles had arrived in a wonderfully colourful broth. The soup was topped with a dash of chilli oil, fresh coriander, pickled vegetables, and a generous portion of shredded spring onion.

The broth had a slightly sour flavour with a nice chilli kick that just tingled on the tongue and helped to clear out my sinuses. The heaps of noodles were bouncy, soft, and worked perfectly with the umami soup.

The pickled vegetables added a lovely crunch to the dish. The beef brisket was extremely tender and could easily be pulled apart using chopsticks.

My friend’s noodle bowl did not come with a broth but was still topped with plenty of vegetables and beansprouts. The noodles were thick and springy but still as soft as the thinner noodles in the soup dish.

The garlic flavour was strong and the dish was a bit less spicy than the pickled cabbage option if you are not a fan of spice. If you want to make it hotter, each table has extra chilli oil you can add.

An extra bonus the restaurant does is free noodle refills. If you have finished your meal and still have lots of soup left, you can get another lot of noodles for free.

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However, we didn’t need extra noodles as we were so full that we had to take home some of our food. Two Treasure is armed with plenty of tubs for takeout so they clearly have people taking home their leftover food regularly.

The noodle spot is truly a treasure in a city with loads of restaurants serving up bowls of ramen. Two Treasure Hand Pulled Noodle Bar is a must-visit for a quick dose of comfort food.

Two Treasure Hand Pulled Noodle Bar can be found at 85 Regent Street. The restaurant is open everyday from 11.30am to 9pm.

All of our food reviews are paid for by the writer. The establishments do not know we will be reviewing their food, allowing us to make fair judgements on each place.

The woman, named locally as Amy Doherty, was found injured at a property in the Summer Meadows Mews area of the city, but sadly died later in hospital

A murder investigation is underway after the death of a woman, who has been named locally as Amy Doherty.

Police were called to the Summer Meadows Mews area of the city at around 10.20am on Saturday, March 21, after the woman was found injured.

She tragically died later in hospital. She has been named locally as mum-of-two Amy Doherty, who was in her late 20s. A 30-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of murder.

On Saturday night, the Mayor of Derry City & Strabane District Council, Cllr Ruairi McHugh said he was “deeply shocked and saddened” by the death of Amy.

“On behalf of the people of Derry and surrounding areas, I would like to extend the heartfelt sympathy & condolences to her family and loved ones during this unimaginably difficult time,” he said.

“No words can ease the pain of such a loss, but please be assured that the community stands with you in grief, support, and solidarity.

“We all mourn together, and our thoughts and prayers are with her family and friends.

“We call on everyone to come together in compassion, to support one another, and to honour Amy’s memory in the days ahead.”

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DUP Councillors Julie Middleton, Niree McMorris and Chelsea Cooke issued a joint statement and said: “As women representing the City at Council, this is utterly devastating news for our city. The loss of a woman’s life in such circumstances is both shocking and deeply distressing for the entire community.

“Our thoughts and prayers are first and foremost with the victim’s family and loved ones as they face unimaginable grief. No family should ever have to endure such heartbreak.

“This is a stark reminder that violence, particularly against women, has no place in our society. Every woman and girl should feel safe in their own home and community.

“We must ensure that those responsible for such heinous acts are brought before the courts and held fully accountable.

“We would appeal to anyone who may have information, no matter how small it may seem, to come forward to the PSNI and assist with their investigation.

“As a community, we must stand together to support the victim’s family and to send a clear message that such violence will never be tolerated.”

Sinn Féin MLA Ciara Ferguson added: “There is widespread shock and devastation across the city to learn that police have launched a murder inquiry after the woman’s death.

“Our heartfelt thoughts are with this woman’s loved ones as they face the unimaginable loss which this horrific crime has brought upon them.

“A young woman’s life was taken in the latest act of violence against women and girls and I appeal to anyone with information to bring it forward to the PSNI.

“The Executive’s Strategic Framework to End Violence Against Women and Girls sets out how it aims to tackle this scourge in our society. But we must all do more to confront the causes and cultures behind this violence and to do everything possible to bring the harm and abuse of women to an end.”

Detective Inspector Michelle Griffin from the Police Service’s Major Investigation Team said: “Officers attended a property in the Summer Meadows Mews area of the city at around 10.20 am and located an injured woman at the scene.

“She was taken to hospital by our colleagues in the NIAS where she sadly died.

“A 30-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of murder.

“Our thoughts are with her family and loved ones, who are left trying to come to terms with this shocking loss.

“Our enquiries are continuing, and I am appealing to anyone with information, no matter how insignificant it may seem, to contact our officers on 101 quoting reference 469 – 21/03/26.”

Information can also be provided, with total anonymity, to the independent charity Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111 or online at www.crimestoppers-uk.org

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