Fox hunting and why it’s important

The coalition government has committed itself to holding a free vote on the repeal of the Hunting Act 2004 which banned fox hunting and hare coursing in England & Wales. Inevitably, the opposition Labour Party will make a huge issue out of it and attempt, as they have done locally in Tameside, to characterise the issue as one of Rich Toffs versus Poor People. It’s class war. One only needs to read Cllr John Taylor’s eloquent (for those of you who don’t know John Taylor, I use the word liberally) letters to the Tameside Advertiser to see how Labour will fight the issue.

So effective has Labour been in making Conservatives ashamed of the policy of a free vote that many at the election were reticent about offering their own support for Fox Hunting. Indeed, some Tories have suggested that vocally pro-hunting activists (such as me) are merely playing Labour’s game and rising to the bait. The purpose of this note therefore is twofold: to present the case for the repeal of the Ban and to encourage other Conservatives to actively embrace the cause.

Before I begin I would like to stress that I have never hunted foxes on a horse and have no financial/family interest in fox hunting. Generally I have better things to do on a Saturday morning such as sleeping. Nonetheless, my interest in the countryside and agriculture is a significant one and I am Chairman of Romiley Young Farmers Club and have had some experience of the behind-the-scenes work of a local drag hunt and therefore feel I am in a position to talk about the issue holistically, i.e., outside of the narrow view that fox hunting is about posh people killing cute furry foxes for fun. I believe that you are probably not naive enough to agree with that description and appreciate the wider implications and inter-relating issues involved in fox hunting.

Firstly, the general argument for the ban is that (a) it sees the cruel torture of an animal; (b), there are more humane forms of killing a fox; and (c) it is a relic of an old aristocratic tradition. I shall very briefly deconstruct each argument in turn.

I am not going to patronise you by saying the fox when it is caught (as nine times out of every ten hunts it is not) suffers a marvellously pain free death. On the contrary it is chased for a prolonged period of time and killed by a hound with a swift bite to the neck. According to the Labour Government’s official inquiry into the issue the fox suffers death within about 20 seconds. My argument here is that it is an unpleasant death but not a cruel one. For example, if we accept the premise that foxes have to be killed because they’re pests (cf. Two incidents of foxes attacking children and foxes attacking livestock) there are only three options to kill a fox: to trap it, shoot it or hunt it. The first one can be rebutted rather swiftly; it’s illegal and leads to an agonising death over a period of several days and of course is non-discriminatory as to who it traps – a fisherman walking through the woods? A child playing? Or even a protected species such as a badger?

Shooting the fox seems like the most attractive option; what can be better than a quick, clean bullet to the head? Well, the fact that the average farmer or even professional shooter can not depend on a ‘quick’ or ‘clean’ shot is a sticking point. Foxes are incredibly swift and quick (hence their cunning characterisation in culture) and this makes a clean kill near-impossible for a reasonable marksman. Currently, the fox population is kept under control by these amateur marksmen and often the fox gets clipped by a couple of pellets of shot or a rifle bullet and can spend days in agony before it dies. Hardly humane. Can you see how a 20 minutes chase and 10 seconds death can seem the most humane method of dispatching a fox despite it being the most gruesome sounding?

As for the argument that fox hunting is a relic of bygone times, perhaps it is. Hunting is absolutely an expensive sport requiring a lot of disposable income and a horse. But so what? These richer people with nothing better to do on a Saturday are providing a free service to society and farmers. It isn’t just killing foxes that is their service either; they regularly repair fences and pick up dead stock from farms thus ensuring our food chain is kept clean and not contaminated by farmers simply burying dead stock (as has happened in the past). If we move the activity of culling foxes away from financially self-sufficient clubs then the burden will fall upon the state to perform that duty. Another expense for the taxpayer.

I’m going to stop here because I could continue to talk about a mountain of other things such as the demographic make-up of hunts and the economic benefits of hunting to the rural economy, but this document from the Countryside Alliance can do that far more eloquently than I can: http://www.countryside-alliance.org.uk/images/stories/pdf/case_repeal.pdf.

Finally, the debate about fox hunting is no where near over – it will be a huge issue when Caroline Spelman presents the free vote bill to Parliament. My message to the ‘antis’ (to use hunting slang) is that your mastery of the arguments is weak, shallow and disingenuous. My more fundamental message to Conservatives is to be proud to support the repeal of the Hunting Act which would see the return of a compassionate and sensible tradition to our countryside.

TH