Mr Scott said the levy, which would be activated in the event of another equine disease outbreak, such as the equine influenza and Hendra virus, would be imposed upon all registered horses, regardless of the risk they posed to Australia’s biosecurity.

“With 80pc of registered horses used for pleasure activities, the burden of this ill-conceived levy will fall on the industry’s recreational sector, despite it being highly unlikely it would be responsible for the introduction of a foreign disease,” Mr Scott said.

“The outbreak of equine influenza last year had a financially devastating impact across all sectors of the horse industry – racehorse owners, jockeys, equine-related small businesses, vets, horse breeders, camp drafters and pony club families were all affected by the virus.

“Should another outbreak of an equine disease occur, imposing such a levy would only further hurt an industry facing financial hardship.

“The Rudd Government should not be focused on recouping costs from a possible future outbreak, but instead should be dedicated to immediately improving our quarantine measures to ensure it does not happen again,” he said.