HORSE owners in The Hills and the Hawkesbury will be relieved to hear they will not have to repay the Federal Government for the cost of responding to last year's equine influenza outbreak.

Agriculture Minister Tony Burke recently announced the Government had decided against imposing a levy on the horse industry to recover its share of the $342 million spent on eradicating the virus and financial assistance.

The Government introduced legislation for a levy into Parliament this year.

This triggered outrage in the horse industry, which blamed failures in quarantine administration for the entry of equine influenza into Australia.

Mr Burke said the Howard government had failed to make arrangements to prepare the horse industry for such an emergency.

He said this meant it would not be proper to legislate retrospectively to recover costs for the 2007 outbreak. The Government now plans to pass the legislation to create a framework for sharing costs of future disease outbreaks, but will not recover the costs of last year's emergency.

Hawkesbury veterinarian Derek Major, who was in the front line of the eradication program, said it was a good decision.

``The horse industry has had a terrible beating with this disease in the last six to eight months and doesn't need any further burden, particularly in view of the fact that the commission of enquiry found some criticism of the Government in its management of quarantine,'' he said.

``It's been a very expensive exercise, but a very successful disease eradication program, almost unprecedented, and I think it's reasonable that the cost be distributed through the entire Australian community. It showed the huge economic impact that the horse industry has in Australia to people in all walks of life.''