A horse was killed during an incident on a busy road in Kilkenny when a sulky was involved in a collision.

The incident took place in front of McDonalds on the Hebron Road shortly after 11pm on June 16. The death has prompted calls for an all out ban on sulky racing.

Garda are investigating the incident and are believed to be considering a number of charges including endangerment, animal cruelty and neglect.

Cllr Andrew McGuinness said that the incident "not only resulted in a dead horse but it could also have caused a serious accident on the Ring Road, and the driver, who appears to be very young, is lucky to be alive."

"We have created laws to ban sulky racing, we have highlighted all of the abuse and we have raised it publicly with the guards on numerous occasions."

"We need to see prosecutions, horses taken away from those who cannot or will not care for them properly, these unregulated and unchecked carts banned off the road altogether and underage people banned from using horses at all on public roads," he added.

"We need to see a willingness from the authorities to clamp down on all the sites scattered around Kilkenny where horses are dumped in fields and areas taken over and turned into makeshift ranches, and not a single penny spent on any horse project until every community takes full responsibility for a problem that has gotten way out of control," Cllr McGuinness concluded.