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Mr. Gray: I fear that the hon. Gentleman's intervention does not deserve a proper response. Of course these people will find other jobs. Many of them are extremely skilled with horses and other animals, and in other ways; but if the hon. Gentleman knows anything about the countryside, he will know that, at the moment, there are not an awful lot of jobs available with dogs, horses and other animals. The notion that all
1,000 of them could get a new job tomorrow is frankly absurd, and I will not dignify it with any more of a response.
Mr. Henry Bellingham (North-West Norfolk): Will my hon. Friend give way on that point?
Mr. Gray: I am seeking to move on to the more substantial point about new clause 1, but I happily give way.
Mr. Bellingham: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. My local hunt, the West Norfolk, made it clear that if hunting were banned it would have to sell the attached kennels and cottages because the raison d'être for those houses would go.
On drag hunting, does my hon. Friend agree that much of the hunting in this country is carried out by beagle or basset hounds, and obviously one cannot hunt a drag on foot, so surely the comment by the hon. Member for Morley and Rothwell (Mr. Challen) shows the sheer ignorance of Labour Members?
Mr. Gray: My hon. Friend is entirely right about drag hunting. There is no way one could replace hare hunting or other forms of foot hunting, in the uplands for example, with drag hunting. That is an absurdity. Many packs could not be replaced by drag hunting.
More important, at the moment, throughout England in particular, many farmers will allow the hunt on to their land because they like it, but they are not about to let a lot of gentry gallop across their land for a drag hunt—that is, apart from a very small number who may earn money as a result. There would be nothing like 350 drag hunts to replace the existing hunts, and anybody who thinks that there would be is quite wrong. In Wiltshire, there are eight or nine packs of hounds, and there is no possibility that the county would maintain the same number of drag hound packs. As I said, one of the things that Lord Burns was absolutely clear about is that there is no question of replacing hunting with drag hunting. They are two entirely different sports, and they bear no relation to each other.
Kate Hoey (Vauxhall): As there seems to be so much ignorance in certain parts of the House about dogs that hunt, would it not be useful for some of the Members who have been sitting here all evening to go across to the green and talk to the many families and owners of hunting dogs there? They might learn just a bit about what hunting dogs do.
Mr. Gray: The hon. Lady is exactly right, and I pay tribute to the many people who are in Parliament square with their hounds and hunting dogs of all varieties. It would be instructive for hon. Members to go and find out a little more about that. I pay tribute to the hon. Lady, whose courage and determination on this issue is second to none and worthy of our respect.
Mr. Edward Leigh (Gainsborough): My hon. Friend is making some excellent points, but I would like him to
set the record straight about something that he said earlier. He said that we had lost the argument. We have not lost the argument; we have lost the vote.
Mr. Gray: I certainly hope that I did not say that, but I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for pointing that out. If I said that we had lost the argument, I certainly did not mean to. In the last 12 months in which I have been involved in the issue, we have won every argument in the Chamber and in Committee. The person who has lost every argument and who has been humiliated by his own Back Benchers is the Minister, who has sought to put his arguments but been voted down by his Back-Bench colleagues on every occasion. He has lost not only the arguments but the votes.
Mr. Russell Brown: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Gray: No, certainly not to the hon. Gentleman.
New clause 1 ranges beyond the question of compensating—
Mr. Brown: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I fully appreciate the fact that the hon. Gentleman can give way to whomsoever he wishes, but I would be grateful for a ruling from the Chair. Is it not a fact that each and every Member of the House has equal status and standing?
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Michael Lord): The only ruling that I will give from the Chair is that the hon. Gentleman is precisely right—it is for the Member who has the floor to decide whether to give way.
Mr. Gray: On a point of principle, may I make it plain, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that I will give way to as many hon. Members who represent English and Welsh constituencies as possible, but I will not give way to Members who represent Scottish constituencies? They can go to Holyrood and pontificate about hunting in Scotland if they wish, but they cannot come here and pontificate about hunting in my constituency, which is a matter only for English and Northern Irish MPs.
David Burnside (South Antrim): I hope that the hon. Gentleman agrees that most of us in the United Kingdom, and certainly the majority of elected representatives from Northern Ireland, are against the draconian ban on hunting, and wish to speak in support of our fellow countrymen in England and Wales to try to prevent this disastrous ban.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. A few minutes ago, the hon. Gentleman said that he wanted to make progress on new clause 1. May I suggest to him and the whole House that we do just that?
Mr. Gray: I am most grateful, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
Mr. Kaufman: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. In view of your response to the point of order raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries
(Mr. Brown), may I draw your attention to clause 16, and ask how it relates to Northern Ireland? On what basis of equity can the hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr. Gray) give way to a Northern Ireland Member but not to a Scottish Member?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: These are not matters that we should be debating at the moment. Our debate is time-limited—we are simply wasting time and should get on with new clause 1.
Mr. Gray: I am most grateful, Mr. Deputy Speaker, as I want to press on with the wider consequences of new clause 1.
Proposed subsection (1) deals with compensation for hunt employees, for which there is an obvious need. I hope that hon. Members on both sides of the House agree about the need for a compassionate interest in such people.
New clause 1, however, seeks to introduce wider compensation. Hunting and industries associated with it play a central role in many rural communities and, thanks to manufacturing, many urban constituencies as well. Walsall, for example, is the heart of English saddle manufacturing, and will be devastated by the abolition of hunting because the English saddle manufacturing industry will be wrecked.
David Winnick (Walsall, North) rose—
Mr. Gray: If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I should like to make progress—[Interruption.] I beg his pardon, he represents Walsall, so I shall give way.
David Winnick: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that a spokesperson for the industry told the local paper last week that it would not be devastated in the locality, and that in fact it has far more extensive work than it used to have? Should he not have done his homework before mentioning my borough and getting his facts wrong?
Mr. Gray: I have indeed done my homework. Not only have I had conversations with the other Walsall MP, the right hon. Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George), who is extremely concerned about the consequences of a ban for Walsall, but I have had a great many conversations with BETA—the British Equestrian Trade Association—which has had detailed discussions with saddle manufacturers in Walsall. BETA is concerned about claims by Walsall manufacturers that they will be badly hit by a ban on hunting. The hon. Member for Walsall, North (David Winnick) knows his constituents better than I do, but BETA, which represents saddle manufacturers, has made those comments, and his colleague, the right hon. Member for Walsall, South, is deeply concerned about the consequences of a ban for the town.
Mr. Stephen O'Brien (Eddisbury): On that point and the question of compensation, especially for people not directly employed by hunts, it is not apparent how the new clause would affect Wycherley's, a saddlery in Malpas supplied by a Walsall firm that has already closed because of the reduction of interest and investment in hunting and fears about what may
happen. Is it true that compensation could be backdated to before the ban on hunting because of the anticipated consequences of the ban?
Mr. Gray: One of the provisions in new clause 1 would indeed invite applicants for compensation to specify when they started to lose their business. Compensation could be backdated to a period before a ban came into effect if it could be demonstrated that that was when people stopped buying saddles.
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