A better society

It’s estimated that from 1997 up to the passing of the Hunting Act in 2004, the three main anti-hunting organisations (the RSPCA, the League Against Cruel Sports and IFAW) spent almost £30 million on various anti-hunting bills, including the measure that eventually became law.

This figure does not include the costs to the public purse incurred through the Burns Inquiry, the Portcullis House Hearings and the on-going financial burden on the police, the Crown Prosecution Service and the courts.

When the Hunting Act was passed the following statements were made by these organisations:

“…the RSPCA heralds this ban on hunting with dogs as marking a watershed in the development of a more civilised society for people and animals.”

RSPCA

“The ban on hunting with dogs will radically change the landscape of animal welfare in the UK…”

IFAW

“The hunting ban is a massive leap forwards to the creation of a decent and humane society.”

League Against Cruel Sports

And yet…

• In July 2005, the RSPCA announces a 78% rise in animal cruelty cases
• In July 2006, the RSPCA says that conviction cases had risen by 20%
• In April 2007, the RSPCA reveals that its workload had increased by 50%
• In April 2008, the RSPCA states that cases of abandoned pets rose by 25%
• In May 2011, the RSPCA says that cases of alleged cruelty rose by 10%
• In April 2012, the RSPCA states that cases of cruelty have risen by 23.5%

Without a single penny being spent on any form of research or survey into the effect the Hunting Act has had on wildlife, the anti-hunting groups continue to doggedly argue that somehow this law has been a milestone for animal welfare. The enormous amount of money that has been spent, and continues to be spent, appears to be an irrelevancy.

I am not one of those people who think that large amounts of money spent on animal welfare is a waste – quite the reverse. As can been seen from the statistics above, animal welfare in these hard economic times seems to be deteriorating, rather than getting better, so it makes it all the more important that funds raised are directed to genuine causes.

The RSPCA recently said that it is facing a funding crisis, with rising costs and legacies dropping. So it is all the more bewildering that the charity can still find money to prosecute members of the Heythrop Hunt for allegedly hunting a fox with hounds – a process that is selective and non-wounding, unlike the other methods of control left legal.

So much for that better society.

Law makers and law breakers

There was a very revealing interview with Eric Joyce, the Member of Parliament for Falkirk, on Channel 4 News last week.

Mr Joyce had caused an affray in a House of Commons bar during which he head-butted a fellow MP, assaulted others and struggled with police officers arresting him shouting, “You can’t arrest me, I’m an MP”. Later he admitted four counts of assault. He was quite candid when interviewed about his past troubles with drink and his propensity to being “quite fighty”. When asked about this in greater detail Eric Joyce said, “I think there is room for a bit of low-level violence.” Did he regret stealing and trashing numerous cars in his youth? “No, not really.”

Yet Eric Joyce was upstanding enough to vote in favour of the Hunting Act in 2004, one of many politicians at the time who were so convinced that hunting with hounds was beyond the pale that those who took part should be criminalised, unlike, perhaps, those who take part in a bit of “low-level violence”.

Take a look at what has happened to some of those who were in the forefront of the campaign to ban hunting. Vehemently anti-hunting former minister Elliot Morley was described as “blatantly dishonest” when sentenced to 16 months imprisonment for false accounting in relation to his MP expenses claims. He had previously said that there was no moral case for hunting (presumably there is for fiddling your expenses).

Eric Illsley, the former MP for Barnsley Central, had voted strongly for various anti-hunting bills and was on record as saying that the punishment meted out to the pro-hunting protesters who invaded the House of Commons was a good example of “a class system in the judiciary”. It was a mockery, he said, later forgetting that it was his fraudulent claim of £14,000 that made a mockery of the MPs expenses system and which resulted in him being sentenced to a year in prison.

A few years previously, a Member of the Scottish Parliament, Lord Watson of Invergowrie, introduced an anti-hunting bill that became the Protection of Wild Mammals (Scotland) Act 2002. He said at the time of its passing into law,“It’s a good day for the Scottish parliament and for a modern Scotland.”  A modern Scotland in which arson is apparently a justified response for being refused a drink, as these were precisely the circumstances that landed Lord Watson a 16 month jail sentence… and led to what should have been an award-winning headline for the Daily Record.

Yet these are the very people – and those mentioned are only some of them – who felt they could claim moral superiority when making a law that had no scientific backing and had every indication of being a product of prejudice. A law hailed at its time of passing that would be “a massive leap forwards to the creation of a decent and humane society” according to one anti hunting group. Well, more on that point coming soon.

Maybe it’s due to that old cliché “Anything is justified when you think right is on your side”, so perhaps it’s no surprise that certain anti-hunt people follow suit and refuse to see any other way to benefit animal welfare apart from their own. Whether it be trespassing to covertly film individuals, physical attacks or bending the rules governing charities, it’s all justified. Listening to some of the pronouncements from the anti-hunting groups, one might believe that they are whiter than white and that many hunts are little more than habitual law-breakers.

One anti-hunt website said, “They seem to think that they are above the law and that there is one law for them and another for everyone else.”

 Yes, but exactly who are we talking about?

News from the frontline

The difference between sitting behind a desk writing propaganda and the reality of life in the wild could not be more stark than in the case of the Hunting Act and its implementation.

Brought into law through a strange cocktail of good and bad intentions, it always had the potential to fall flat on its face when put into practice. That’s not to say that there haven’t been successful prosecutions – there have – but the vast majority of these cases could have been brought under pre-existing legislation. The Hunting Act wasn’t needed to catch these people.

But what about the people who haven’t been caught?  ‘Animal abusers’ like West Country farmer Giles Bradshaw, for example, who consistently breaks the law by using his dogs to chase away deer from his woodland and then compounds his criminality by viciously not shooting those deer as the Hunting Act requires. His excuse for this cruel act is that he doesn’t want to see deer killed unnecessarily. Yes, funny that, isn’t it? An animal welfare law that makes you shoot an animal when you would prefer not to. Don’t believe me? Well, here’s the wording from the Act:

“Stalking a wild mammal, or flushing it out of cover, is exempt hunting if the conditions in this paragraph are satisfied”…one of which is…”the stalking or flushing out does not involve the use of more than two dogs”…and another is…”reasonable steps are taken for the purpose of ensuring that as soon as possible after being found or flushed out the wild mammal is shot dead by a competent person.” 

In fact, reading the whole Act would be an interesting exercise for many anti hunt people, who simply assume that this law is a good thing and might be surprised by the strange and illogical nature of its drafting. Of course most won’t do that and it is this ignorance that is exploited by the anti-hunting groups.

Giles is not an animal abuser; he doesn’t even own a gun and for years has used his dogs to humanely move deer and foxes away to protect his woodland and livestock. These animals are not killed or hurt in any way and most people are happy…apart from those who think that he is breaking the law and making their precious Hunting Act look ridiculous. As recently as September last year the Chief Constable of Devon and Cornwall said in a letter to Giles, “…such activity would amount to an offence under the Hunting Act unless it is covered by an exemption provided by the Act.”  Quite what the animal welfare benefits are in those exemptions has never been properly explained by anyone associated with the Hunting Act and why Giles’ actions should be regarded as illegal must be a mystery to most people.

Even before the Act came into force, DEFRA appeared to be a little confused in their response to Giles’ actions when they were reported in the Daily Telegraph at the end of 2004. Was it against the law or not?  Here’s how DEFRA reacted:

• 24^th November 2004 – DEFRA states that ‘chasing away’ a wild mammal with dogs is illegal under the Hunting Act.
• 26^th November 2004 – DEFRA officials change their minds and state that ‘chasing away’ is not hunting and therefore not covered by the Act.
• 15^th December 2004 – DEFRA officials change their minds again, stating that the deliberate use of dogs in chasing unwanted wild mammals from land is illegal. However, using a barking dog to scare away animals is not illegal.
• 9^th February 2005 – DEFRA officials change their minds yet again, stating that using a barking dog to frighten away a wild mammal is actually illegal under the Hunting Act.
• 14^th February 2005 – DEFRA officials change their minds once again to say that, “The Hunting Act does not make it an offence for a dog to chase or otherwise hunt a wild mammal. It makes it an offence for a person to hunt a wild mammal with a dog (unless his hunting is exempt)”  

So that’s clear then.

DEFRA isn’t the only body that appears confused about the Hunting Act. On the RSPCA’s Twitter response service @RSPCA-Frontline, Giles Bradshaw recently asked the following question, “do you support me refusing to shoot the deer that I use my dogs to disperse?”  The reply was honest, if a little surprising, “Not expert on the Act but agree it’s clumsy.”  How does this sit with the “law works perfectly well” and “the Hunting Act is an effective piece of animal welfare legislation” lines spun by the League Against Cruel Sports? 

Perhaps the RSPCA is slowly coming to its senses on how the hunting issue might be resolved.  A second question from Giles on the subject of wider wild mammal protection from cruelty prompted this, “all wilful cruelty is not only morally wrong, it should be species non-specific & illegal”, precisely the grounds on which the Wild Mammals Welfare Bill is based (see Wild mammal welfare and the Donoughue principle). Again, contradicting the LACS who perversely say that such a bill does not improve animal welfare.

All of this is the inevitable result of the fact that some legislators allowed their petty prejudices and personal dislikes to rule their decisions. In their minds the anomalies and difficulties now faced by people like Giles Bradshaw were always secondary to winning a silly political battle.

Yet ironically, in doing so, they have created a situation that is a constant day-to-day reminder for many people in the frontline of wildlife management as to why the Hunting Act should be repealed.                                                                

 

A paucity of argument

Given the amount of enthusiasm displayed by some MPs for retaining the Hunting Act, it is a little odd that very few want to discuss or explain the reasons for their stance. There again, no doubt many feel that as their law is on the statute book and that the numbers are tight as far as a vote on repeal is concerned, why open up a dialogue that might lead to some messy conclusions about what effect this legislation is actually having on wildlife?

There are, however, some positions held by politicians that demand at least some sort of explanation, if not justification, for the views and policies that they advocate and support.  One such role is that of a Shadow Minister, who, one might think, should be more than willing and able to state clearly why a particular view is held. Not so in the case of Mary Creagh, the Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

 Many will know that Labour MP Kate Hoey is Chairman of the Countryside Alliance and never appears to shy away from explaining CA policies. Over the Christmas period Mary Creagh had said, “There is no place for animal cruelty in a civilised society.”   Kate wrote to Ms Creagh stating that she totally supports that view. However, the crux of her detailed letter concentrated on the Shadow Minister’s certainty that animal welfare has been improved by the Hunting Act and the information that allowed her to be so sure.

Given that literally millions of pounds have been spent by anti hunting groups to ensure this measure became law, that millions more – this time tax payers money – has been spent trying to enforce the legislation and the claim that yet another million pounds is about to be spent in employing “investigators” to bring even more prosecutions, it is a damning indictment that not a single penny could be found by those in support of the Hunting Act to examine its effects on wildlife.

Kate’s letter legitimately raised this point and ended with an offer to discuss the matter further …and what was the reply from Ms Creagh?  “The Hunting Act was passed by Labour in government, it is settled policy and I have no intention of re-opening the issue.”  

I thought it worth another attempt to elicit the substance behind that “settled policy” and wrote to Ms Creagh, but I the only information I received in the reply was the earth-shattering news that, “The majority of the British public support the Hunting Act and want to keep the ban on hunting with dogs in place. The vast majority of the Parliamentary Labour Party share this view.”  So there we have it, the reason the Hunting Act should stay is not because it improves animal welfare, but rather a polling figure indicates that most people are against repeal.  Fair enough many will say, that’s what democracy is about, but how was that figure reached?  

The poll that seems to be most widely quoted was undertaken by Ipsos MORI in September 2009. Under the emotive heading, “Now a question about sports where animals are set on other animals to fight or kill them.” questions were asked about certain activities being made legal, starting with dog fighting. Question 2 was on legalising badger baiting and it was only when we get to question 3 that foxhunting is mentioned, well and truly after the tone of the poll had been set.  Apart from the morons that take part in dog fighting and badger baiting, who on earth is calling for these activities to be made legal? Can it be right that such irrelevant questions be included in a poll? Isn’t there just a hint here of weighting the poll in favour of certain answers?

So many aspects of this poll were wrong, involving incorrect, misleading and inappropriate information, further compounded by a failure to follow established polling procedure.

While the body governing polling companies in the UK, the Market Research Society (MRS), initially rejected a complaint signed by six MPs and Peers from across the political spectrum, the independent reviewer said upon appealing that decision, “No attempt seems to have been made to address the substance of the complaint, namely that the nature of the activities of badger baiting and dog fighting were inherently different to hunting.”  But the minds of those who control the MRS were made up and the results of this poll continue to be peddled by anti hunting groups and believed by the gullible. This, according to Mary Creagh, is the basis of her argument…which is not really an argument at all. 

A further letter was sent to Ms Creagh a few weeks ago, this time concluding, “Like it or not, the issue of the repealing the Hunting Act will return to the political agenda at some stage and it will require a more detailed response than you have been able to give so far.” At the point of writing, no reply has been received from Ms Creagh, just as there was no reply from the Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, when similar questions were put to him after his U-turn on hunting (see Mr Speaker…not speaking ).

 Both happy to state their positions, but neither capable of explaining precisely why.  

 

 

 

Wild mammal welfare and the Donoughue principle

“We need to achieve a proper balance between the needs of animal welfare, the need to avoid deliberate cruelty and the rights of the countryside to pursue its sports such as hunting.” So said Labour peer Lord Donoughue in explaining his thinking about repeal of the Hunting Act to the Sunday Telegraph in 2010.

The long-running controversy over whether or not hunting with dogs should be banned is an example of how easily an important issue can be hijacked and turned into a purely political argument, quite divorced from reality. It would be almost laughable if it were not for the fact that wild animals are now suffering in greater numbers. Lord Donoughue sums up the challenge very clearly and indeed has been at the forefront to find a solution.

If everyone who is genuinely concerned about the welfare of wild mammals could take a step back from what they think they know about hunting – and hunting people – it might just open the door to a fair resolution to an issue that remains stubbornly difficult for many legislators.

Where does one begin? Well, shouldn’t every law start with a principle? Certainly the prevention of unnecessary suffering is a principled aim, but to then assume that all one has to do is ban hunting with dogs to achieve this is as naïve as it is ridiculous. Yet it was this simple assumption that played a large part in putting the hunting ban into law. Here’s what a former director of the International Fund for Animal Welfare claimed during one of the many debates beforehand, “All we need to do is look at what happens in areas where there is already no hunting or where hunting has ended. There we find no hunting and no welfare problem either.” So take hunting with dogs out of the picture and everything would be fine, would it? This is the sort of crass nonsense that has conned the public and some gullible MPs into believing that a hunting ban is a good thing.

Back to that principled position. For many years the legal definition of cruelty has been the deliberate infliction of unnecessary suffering. It’s obvious that legislation which outlaws all unnecessary suffering to all wild mammals in all circumstances is not only broader than a ban on hunting with dogs but fairer too. Furthermore, such a law would be far more workable than the Hunting Act, which is confusing and based on an assumption of cruelty. It contains illogical clauses that create technical offences rather than ones that genuinely improve animal welfare.

Domestic animal legislation

The first animal protection law was passed in 1822, championed by Richard Martin MP (see Humanity Dick Martin), and laid the foundation for all subsequent welfare legislation, continuing via different Acts of Parliament relating various activities such as baiting, vivisection etc. The Protection of Animal Act was introduced in 1911 and covered domestic animals and captive wild animals. It was later superseded by the Animal Welfare Act 2006. Yet apart from those held in captivity, wild animals living in the wild are not included in this legislation. This is partly due to the fact that wild animals by that very definition are not under human control and it would be impossible to create a situation in which humans were somehow responsible for the welfare of individual wild animals. (This is totally different to the moral responsibility mankind has to care for the environment in which these animals live or indeed an act of mercy if a wounded or injured wild animal is found). It is also the case that actions undertaken towards wild animal populations, for example in limiting numbers or controlling disease and the methods used, do not necessarily apply to domestic animals. Life in the Wild, a paper by the Veterinary Association for Wildlife Management, (www.vet-wildlifemanagement.org.uk ) explains these points in detail. 

The Wild Mammals (Protection) Act 1996

Before 1996, it was legal to cause any amount of suffering to a wild mammal for any reason, unless it was of a species specifically protected by legislation. Particular laws, such as that covering deer, prohibit certain methods of catching and killing and lay down close seasons in order to protect the populations from being over-exploited. Other methods of killing any wild animal, such as the use of crossbows, were also made illegal under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. Yet there was no law preventing a sadistic act of torture to say a fox cub or hedgehog. This situation was continually cited in order to justify the introduction of anti hunting legislation.

The Wild Mammals (Protection) Act was passed in 1996 and for the first time gave limited protection to all wild mammals by criminalising certain actions, such as mutilating, impaling, burning, stoning or drowning. The Act, in seeking to clarify its intention and prevent mischievous cases being brought, also exempted any reasonable action undertaken in lawful hunting and other legitimate activities. The current law, therefore, grants only a degree of protection from cruelty to all wild mammals.

Repeal and replace

The Committee of Inquiry into Hunting with Dogs in England and Wales (the Burns Report) stated in 2000, “In the absence of a ban, one possible legislative approach would be to remove the present exemptions for hunting in the Wild Mammals (Protection) Act 1996. This would be an important signal and give opponents of hunting a clearer opportunity to test their views about cruelty in the courts.”

Yet as early as 1951, the Committee on Cruelty to Wild Animals (the Scott Henderson Report), set up under the then Labour government, stated, “All wild animals should be brought within the provisions of the Protection of Animals Acts. This will make it possible for action to be taken against any person who causes or permits unnecessary suffering to a wild animal.”

Lord Donoughue has championed two parliamentary bills based on the principle outlined above and in both cases received overwhelming support from all sides in the House of Lords, as well as being welcomed by the Country Land and Business Association, the National Farmers Union and the Countryside Alliance. Mirroring in part domestic animal protection, such a law would have made causing unnecessary suffering to any wild mammal a criminal offence. Accusations of cruelty would be tested in a court of law, as in the case of domestic animals, on the basis of evidence, not opinion or assumption.

Unfortunately, when Lembit Öpik introduced the same Bill into the House of Commons in early 2004 it was talked out, as it would have made an anti-hunting bill redundant – the scent of victory in passing the Hunting Act being too strong and nothing was going to deter those MPs obsessed with a hunting ban. Pathetic objections were raised against the bill and members of the House of Commons were undoubtedly misled by spurious claims of “evidence” that supposedly undermined the bill – “evidence” that, despite numerous requests, has never been produced even to this day.

Could such a law work?

Importantly, there is a part of the UK where the principle of just such a law has been in force – Northern Ireland. The Welfare of Animals Act (Northern Ireland) 1972, granted protection to not only domestic and captive animals but to all animals, wild included (unlike UK mainland law). The new Welfare of Animals Act (NI) 2011 has changed that situation to a degree.

Nevertheless, for decades it had been open to anyone in Northern Ireland who felt that unnecessary suffering had been caused to a wild animal, whether it be during a hunt or any other activity, to test their views in court. The Hunting Act 2004 does not extend to Northern Ireland, where hunting continues, and no case of cruelty has ever been brought, yet the means to stop it were in place since 1972 – if the scientific evidence existed.

The proposal for such a law to replace the Hunting Act brought forward a quite amazing response from the then chief executive of the League Against Cruel Sports, “The problem with that suggestion is that someone would actually have to be cruel to the animal before they could be charged with any offence.” Most people would consider that to be exactly what the law should do.

This comment, however, makes clear two very important points. The first is that anti-hunting groups feel that their precious Hunting Act is worth more than wider legislation covering all wild mammals. The second is that these groups obviously suspect that the evidence of unnecessary suffering in using scenting hounds to manage wild mammals would not stand up in court.

A reasonable point of view might be that whatever side one happens to take in the hunting debate, this route is the right and proper way to resolve the issue. The need for any future debates over hunting legislation is completely negated, removing it from the political agenda by providing a fair and principled basis to improve wild mammal welfare.

After all, do we want governments picking and choosing particular activities they wish to prohibit depending upon their political prejudices? Surely government’s role should be to put in place the means for any activity to be judged on the merits of the evidence available… and that is precisely what a law based on the Donoughue principle would do.

Broad minded or broad views?

A few days ago the Sunday Telegraph reported that shadow DEFRA minister, Gavin Shuker, was showing a “broad-minded approach” to shooting. “It’s vital that the people who make laws understand the activities they legislate on,” he said.

It is a pity this view wasn’t put into practice at the time of the passing of the Hunting Act.

The line that shooting was always better than hunting with dogs was constantly spun by the anti –hunting groups in the run-up to the parliamentary debates on hunting, even though there was no research to support such a contention. The All Party Parliamentary Middle Way Group (MWG) commissioned a study into wounding rates in foxes that are shot and the results showed a much higher degree for wounding than previously thought. Was this taken on board by the then Rural Affairs minister Alun Michael? Not a bit.

Even trying to raise the issue at a meeting of the Associate Parliamentary Group for Animal Welfare, a body of MPs that one would think would have the welfare of the hunted or shot animal uppermost in their minds came to nothing.  Despite numerous promises from the then chairman to find time in a session to discuss the wounding of foxes, every other animal issue appeared to be more important.

Then we had the Portcullis House Hearings, which on the face of it seemed like a good idea. The reality turned out to be quite different. Clearly, the three main anti-hunting groups, the League Against Cruel Sports, the RSPCA and IFAW, were reluctant to take part from the outset, while Countryside Alliance and the MWG felt this was an opportunity for evidence, rather than opinion, to shine through. Each group was allowed to choose experts to make submissions to the hearings and the anti-hunters put forward their choices first. However, when it came to one of the experts chosen by the MWG, Professor Stuart Harrop, the anti hunting groups objected, saying that if Professor Harrop attended they would pull out of the whole process.

Natural justice would say that each side should be allowed to put forward anyone they wished within reason. If one thinks that a particular person would do good for their case, then so be it. But not here. Perhaps it just might have had something to do with the fact that Professor Harrop was at one time the Legal Director of the RSPCA and after leaving has expressed views that were not entirely opposed to hunting? So, another example of legislators being prevented from information that might give them a better understanding. The Portcullis House Hearings, instead of being a genuine chance to examine expert evidence, was more process designed to reach a particular conclusion, with witnesses sometimes being prevented from discussing alternative methods of control – ‘straightjacketed’  into what they could and couldn’t say.

Even during the committee stage of the Hunting Bill, as it then was, some MPs showed their amazing ignorance of the variety of activities, the futures of which they were happy to sit in judgement upon. I heard one MP halfway through the numerous committee sessions ask a LACS official outside about some form of hunting in which shotguns were used. “Gun packs” was the reply, along with a quick description of how they work, all of which came as a complete revelation to someone who was charged with making a law about the hunting with dogs and who should at least have done some homework.  No wonder then that the Hunting Act turned out to be such poor legislation.

So can we expect a change of attitude from the shadow DEFRA team if it comes to power? Well, listen to what Gavin Shuker said at a LACS wildlife symposium last year, “When it comes to hunting, I don’t care about tradition, a way of life or any other arguments. It isn’t right and despite what some former leaders of my own party might say, it was right to ban it.” 

Broad-minded?   Doesn’t look like it.

 

 

 

The Wrong Stuff

Watching a discussion about hunting on the TV programme The Wright Stuff  last week was a depressing affair. Normally there is a fairly balanced panel debating all sorts of topical issues and Matthew Wright himself can be very entertaining…but not this time.

Prime Minister David Cameron had said on the BBC the previous day that he saw the Hunting Act as bizarre piece of legislation – something with which any reasonable person would agree if they’d bothered to examine this law – and that the House of Commons would have an opportunity to vote on its repeal. This prompted The Wright Stuff to discuss the issue. The panel consisted of Anita Dobson, wife of the strongly anti-hunting Queen guitarist Brian May, TV presenter Terry Christian and that expert on everything, Sally Bercow, wife of The Speaker of the House of Commons. Hardly surprising then that it took only seconds before the words like “posh”, toffee-nosed” and “big estates” were used in the defence of the Hunting Act, as if somehow they relate to animal welfare.

According to Anita Dobson there is no one, apart from the Prime Minister, who is in favour of repealing the Hunting Act, an indication perhaps of the circles in which she moves. Terry Christian thought foxhunting to be cruel, but wouldn’t mind it coming back if it meant David Cameron going.

Sally Bercow, showing her vast knowledge of hunting, declared, “If you must kill foxes, and I don’t think you should, there are far more humane ways of doing it than hunting.” Then quickly back to her central theme, “Cameron is just the embodiment of fox-slaughtering Tory tofftdom.” The law is “effective and humane” she says, without providing a shred of evidence to show what is now being done to those foxes by other means.

So, a well-balanced and informative piece…at least in the minds of the show’s producers.

What this nonsense, especially the rubbish spouted by Mrs Speaker, indicates is that the arguments against hunting with dogs have not changed over decades. And why should they? All that is needed is an attack on “toffs” and empty phrases claiming that there are better ways to control wild mammals – but without explaining what those ways might be. Contrast this with the views and work of those who doubt that the hunting ban has been such a good idea and it’s clear that the scientific basis for a hunting ban simply does not exist. This work, such as that undertaken by the Veterinary Association for Wildlife Management, shows the benefits in using scenting hounds, which are selective and non-wounding. It highlights the need for proper wildlife management, as opposed to simple pest control, to keep populations in check and healthy and how the use of hounds is natural for both hunter and hunted.

In addition, there is the obvious sense in having a genuine wild mammal welfare law based on evidence and not the type of class-ridden prejudice heard on this TV programme, but none of this was raised in a programme that really didn’t want to know. Researchers from The Wright Stuff were in contact with the League Against Cruel Sports, but not the Countryside Alliance or indeed anyone opposed to the hunting ban as far as I know. Perhaps if they had done so they might have been told about the totally unprincipled, illogical and downright anti-animal welfare sections contained in the Hunting Act. They might have questioned why millions of pounds have been spent in support of the Hunting Act, yet not a penny in examining its effects on wild mammal welfare. The debate might, had animal welfare been the central issue here, even touched upon the wounding issue. But of course the main point here wasn’t animal welfare.

The trouble is, many people will happily tell you how much they dislike hunting with hounds without really knowing anything about it or its alternatives and the same people will think that this law must be good legislation without ever reading a word of the Hunting Act. This is the situation exploited by certain politicians and pseudo-politicians like the Sally Bercows of this world, who see the hunting issue as the perfect vehicle for their prejudices.

Yet, try to engage with these die-hard antis in an attempt to point out some of the anomalies in the Hunting Act and they simply refuse to accept a different point of view, saying that nothing will change their minds – and in that they are probably right. Again, why should they let facts get in the way when they think they are winning? In virtually every debate in which I have taken part, whether in the media or a face-to-face talk, the extreme antis have an obsession with the hunting ban that will not be shaken. It doesn’t matter what evidence is produced that undermines their position or what else one may do in terms of benefiting animal welfare, if you are in favour of hunting you are “evil” and “vile”, just two of the range of colourful words used to describe hunters during a recent radio debate in which I took part.

The anti hunting politicians, for the time being at least, can also get away with the same tactic and avoid awkward questions, but when the occasion arrives for the vote on repealing the Hunting Act the challenge will be to raise the debate to a higher order. That will be the test, not only of the arguments in favour of hunting with hounds, but also of the calibre of politician we have elected to the House of Commons.