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Lord Hoyle: My Lords, my noble friend said that bear-baiting was different because it was a spectator sport and people could bet on it. Will he comment on the Waterloo Cup and hare coursing?
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, I should be happy to see the Waterloo Cup and hare coursing subjected to much greater control. However, that is not my view as regards the hunting of foxes with hounds.
Nowhere does the Burns report suggest that a ban was justified on any grounds. That case has not been made and there is not now even a crude majority in favour of doing so according to the opinion polls. The decline of 20 per cent in the support for a ban since the 1997 general election—that is, in less than five years—is a sign of the way that public opinion changes as it becomes better informed.
I know that many noble Lords on the Conservative Benches genuinely prefer and believe in principle in the status quo and hunting with supervision but without licensing. On the previous occasion we discussed the matter many noble Lords on the Conservative Benches argued that our middle way proposals were too complex, too bureaucratic and too expensive. We have worked to meet those criticisms and to simplify and refine our proposals without diminishing the powers of the proposed new hunting authority. Therefore, I hope that that argument will no longer be made.
As regards licensing, I emphasise what I consider the key point; namely, that to license is to legitimise. That is, of course, why some of my noble friends object to licensing. I repeat that to license is to legitimise. That applies to alcohol, shotguns, brothels and so on. Noble Lords on the Conservative Benches may prefer the unlicensed status quo but, frankly, the political reality is that it is not seriously on offer. I urge noble Lords on the Conservative Benches not to repeat the mistake they made in the previous Session when they rejected the prospect of preserving legitimate hunting and so gave renewed hope to those who seek a ban. Moreover, I urge those noble Lords not to rely on taking to the barricades. Arthur Scargill, we recall, did that and we know what happened to the mining industry and the mine workers' union.
The only practical, political choice today is between middle way licensing and a ban. Votes that are withheld from the middle way assist the ban. Frankly, those of us who support the middle way today need the maximum number of votes for licensing. I hope that the total number of votes in both Houses for that approach will exceed the total number of votes for the ban. That would give a form of parliamentary legitimacy, should the Government wish to take a more compromised route rather than follow the vote in one Chamber.
To the Cross Benches, fortunately, I need say nothing more because they always understand such matters very well. I urge that we concentrate on the two basic questions. The first question concerns liberty—the liberties of rural people to pursue a traditional sport would be infringed, with no public interest justification for a ban. The second question involves the complex issue of animal welfare. No option excludes some animal suffering, but the middle way has animal welfare at its heart.
The middle way is not just a compromise between two dogmatic extremes. It is a radically different approach, which is geared to protecting animal welfare and human liberty. I urge all who believe in rights and liberties to vote for the middle way and against a ban.
12.22 p.m.
Lord Mancroft: My Lords, I know that there is, as the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, said, a manifesto commitment to hold today's debate, but I regret its timing. Our time might have been better spent considering other manifesto commitments and attempting to reverse the collapse in our public services.
I am speaking today not because I am a fox hunter but because, as a board member of the Countryside Alliance, I may be able to help noble Lords to reach as constructive a conclusion to this debate as possible. Hunting, of course, has not changed during the past year, since we last debated it before the general election. We had a sensible debate and at the end of it we voted decisively. I hope that noble Lords will vote just as decisively against a ban in the first Division today.
It seems to me that today's debate needs to focus more carefully on the political position in which we find ourselves, to see if there is some way in which we can finally put this issue to bed. One point is absolutely clear—the public are now heartily sick of this debate and rightly believe that the Government and Parliament would do better to concentrate on the issues that concern them, such as schools, hospitals, transport and crime. A debate on hunting does nothing to encourage people about the relevance of the political process, particularly if they had attended the debate in the other place last night.
I detect, too, a certain boredom about covering the matter in the press. However, I am encouraged that the press, including what used to be called the Left-wing press, has now almost completely swung against a ban. I cannot also help but notice how much criticism the Government have taken for allowing this subject to resurface again. The press coverage also makes it clear that the case for a ban is universally rejected and that the issue is now seen as one involving the rights of individuals and minorities. Arguments about animal rights and class warfare are simply no longer credible.
At the same time, hunting's opponents cannot argue that their view is supported by the majority. The majority, as the noble Lord, Lord Donoughue, said, has now swung against a ban. More importantly, the overwhelming majority want the issue to be settled and settled quickly.
I cannot speak for the hunting community—I should not dream of trying to do so—but I can say with confidence that it, too, has had enough. It has been attacked—often physically—abused, insulted and threatened, again and again and year after year. The final insult now is that many in that community believe that they are being used as a pawn in a political game in which they have no interest. As a result, they are extremely angry, on top of which they are tough, resilient and very well organised. They will not surrender their way of life.
During the Committee stage of the Government's Hunting Bill, the Countryside Alliance presented its own option, which encompassed a system of open and independent regulation. I hope that we made it clear
that the various hound sports have rules, codes of conduct and a proper regulatory body—the Independent Supervisory Authority for Hunting. I accept that hunting may have been slow to modernise, but the fact is that there is now a transparent independent regulatory authority which works, and it has been doing so for some time. Although I know that some people, for some extraordinary reason, do not approve of hunting, I have never heard anybody argue that we do not keep our own rules. It would therefore have been pretty odd if, during the passage of the Hunting Bill, I had not been confident about the option that I had helped to fashion.At the same time, noble Lords may recall that I was more than a little sceptical about the middle way option as it was presented. I know that a number of noble Lords felt that the hunting community was wrong to reject that option out of hand. However, we did not reject it out of hand. We had a number of concerns about it. The noble Lord, Lord Donoughue, explained most of them to the House. We believed that the middle way option added little to the system of self-regulation and that it had a number of disadvantages. But it has changed.
I hope and believe that we made it clear that we were not opposed to some form of statutory underpinning of the existing system, provided that the details were workable. There are of course some caveats. The hunting community has already gone some way towards regaining the confidence of the general public and the press and it is unlikely to sign up to a process that will, over a period of time, be used as a ratchet slowly to regulate hunting out of existence. It will not on any account throw coursing or stag hunting as a trophy to be done away with. Should that be the case, the Countryside Alliance will advise its members to reject the process. Any regulation must be genuinely independent, and that includes being independent of politicians.
The conduct of this debate in Scotland has drawn attention to the practical difficulties of legislation that focuses on human behaviour. That has brought the Scottish Parliament into disrepute. The issue will now have to be settled in the courts but, until it is, it would be an unwise government who travelled down that path.
On the face of it, there may now therefore seem to be even fewer reasons for adopting the middle way option than there were previously. However, times have changed. Since December, when hunting resumed, we have operated under a regime of permits although, for reasons associated with foot and mouth, that regime is somewhat cumbersome. But it worked and caused few problems. In part, that is due to the sympathetic and helpful way in which staff at local DEFRA offices worked with hunts. They are to be congratulated on that and we thank them. That has gone some way towards meeting the concerns that hunts had about licensing.
Many noble Lords may not be aware that hunting has operated under a licensing system in respect of National Trust land, Forestry Commission land and
MoD land. That arrangement worked but it caused some problems. In particular, the unfortunate fact that two Ministers sought to use the licensing system to impose their own personal views did much damage. That must never be allowed to happen again; that is one of the reasons such a regime must be truly independent.Noble Lords will recall that the Burns report, which was widely welcomed in this House, went beyond its remit to suggest that a licensing system might produce an answer to that dilemma. It is inconceivable that the inquiry team would have made such a suggestion if it had concluded that hunting was inherently cruel.
The Countryside Alliance understands the difficulties that the Government have with that issue and we have no desire to quarrel with them; indeed, we would prefer to work with them. I hope that the Government will not make the mistake of taking that as a sign of weakness. It is one year and one day exactly since the foot and mouth crisis caused us to cancel what would have been the largest demonstration that this country had ever seen. A substantial number of my friends want to march again, and some want to go further, so strongly do they feel about this unwarranted threat to their way of life. I cannot emphasise enough the feeling of real anger that there is in the countryside about the fact that, following the worst year that anyone can remember, we are back in Parliament once again talking about hunting.
The noble Lord, Lord McNally, rightly said that Parliament decides and should decide. However, Parliament will bear the responsibility for its decision if the Government and Back-Benchers succeed in declaring war on a substantial minority within the electorate. That would be a terrible route to go down.
But we are prepared to give the Government the breathing space that they need to resolve their problems, and we have persuaded our supporters to go along with this at the moment. The chairman of the Masters of Foxhounds Association believes that he can persuade his members that the regulatory regime should be underpinned with a statutory licensing system, along the lines proposed by the Middle Way Group. We have some justification in hoping that the other hunting organisations will follow his lead, although I should emphasise that that is not a foregone conclusion.
The second element of the middle way option, as described by the noble Lord, Lord Donoughue, concerns the introduction of the Wild Mammals (Protection) Act 1996. The perception of cruelty is the one genuine issue that concerns people. I have hunted all my life in the certain knowledge that nothing that is done in properly conducted hunting causes more suffering than other methods of control—and a great deal less than most. I believe that it should be an offence deliberately to cause unnecessary suffering to any creature, and I am content to allow the courts to exercise their judgment in respect of hunting. I am slightly perplexed as to why hunting's opponents do not share my confidence.
Of course, I am concerned that we shall face a barrage of litigation and be dragged through the courts. That is exactly what happened following the passage of the Protection of Badgers Act some years ago and I hope that we can find a way of dealing with it. But it is important because this second element deals effectively and conclusively with the cruelty issue.
There are considerable risks for the hunting community in going down that path. Many in our community want nothing to do with it and would prefer to continue the political fight. They believe that the present system works well and that the proposed system will slowly but surely throttle them.
I do not hold that view. I believe that the middle way proposal can be made to operate if it is truly independent, and that we have little to fear from the courts. The board of the Countryside Alliance is willing to try to persuade its members and supporters, which now include over 500,000 fishermen, and the leaders of the hunting community to support us in trying to make this work. In order to do that, we need not only the resolve of the Middle Way Group, which I am sure we shall have, but also the support of your Lordships to give us the space to try. Having gained that space, most importantly of all, we need the Government to display a little courage, openness and honesty in their handling of this issue—qualities which, I am afraid, have not been entirely obvious in the debates thus far.
Consequently, we must take this one-off opportunity. When the Divisions are called, I shall of course vote against a ban. When the second Division is called—on the so-called middle way option—I shall vote "content". I hope that noble Lords on all sides of the House, regardless of their views on hunting, will see that this is the only chance that we have of finding a peaceful resolution of this interminable and divisive debate.
12.32 p.m.
Lord Harrison: My Lords, when it comes to blood sports, I am a spoilsport. When it comes to the hunting party, I am a party-pooper. When it comes to hunting with the hounds, my attitude is that of dog in the manger.
Killing for pleasure is wrong and should be banned. Fox hunting, stag hunting and hare coursing are moral issues. It is time that we stood up for morality. The commandment "Thou shall not kill" may be hedged with exceptions. "Thou shall not kill for pleasure" is not; it is a commandment for the 21st century and it is time that we respected it unambiguously, without prevarication and without procrastination.
I do not want to regurgitate the general arguments against hunting that I employed in your Lordships' House when last we discussed the issue. I want, instead, to parse the proposals of the so-called "Middle Way Group" and suggest that drag hunting is the best route to find a solution to this blot on the English landscape.
The middle way is still driving on the wrong side of the road; it still permits the killing of the fox for pleasure. One cannot kill half a fox. Like Monty Python's parrot, a fox torn apart by hounds remains dead, deceased and off its perch for ever. Before the fox has been dispatched—sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly—it will have suffered the agonies of the pursuit by animals four times its size and four times its strength. The middle way is a compromise that still seriously compromises the welfare of the fox.
From that evident and unvarnished truth, there is no swerve, cover or bolt-hole. It is time its supporters owned up, as does, indeed, Peter Luff, MP, a leading exponent. His website declares that the middle way's proposals are, indeed, "not a compromise". Let us abandon, then, this piece of perverse prevarication. The middle way is the muddle way for those who are tiring of the chase. A ban must come, and it must come now.
Having asserted that fox hunting is cruel, which it is, perhaps I may pose a slightly different question. Do those who participate in fox hunting find the cruelty inflicted on the fox an integral part of their enjoyment of hunting? I believe that the answer is no. I am sure that a small minority gain some perverse pleasure at humiliating and hounding the fox. But the majority are not sadists in red satin. They enjoy the ride over England's unparalleled countryside; they warm to the test of skill between rider and horse; they celebrate the work of the hounds pursuing the scent; and, above all, they love the camaraderie and companionship of their fellow riders and the attendant pleasures of dressing and drinking gin in the pink. They value, too, the social life that flows from the hunt, the point-to-points, the hunt balls and the general exchange of being part of a community with a common cause. All of us can recognise that hunt for human companionship. It is what marks us out with our essential humanity.
But here is the interesting thing. Absent from that list of why people love hunting is mention of the cruel chase and the killing of the fox. If that is true, why oh why does the hunting fraternity want to retain the one element of its activity which is repulsive and rebarbative to the vast majority of our fellow citizens—the wanton pursuit and killing of a live mammal? There is a better way.
I support the real alternative of drag hunting, which allows those involved in live quarry hunting to continue their activities in a similar way but without the cruelty that the British public abhor. As noble Lords know, in drag hunting followers ride after hounds trailing a scent laid over country by a horseback rider pulling a scented drag. The trail includes fences and other obstacles which are more or less difficult according to the tastes and experience of those taking part. Bloodhound hunts are very similar but involve fewer hounds following the scent of a person on foot. As the trails are laid out in advance, drag and bloodhound hunts can avoid trespass and there is less risk of hounds straying across roads and railways and into residential areas.
Drag and bloodhound hunting are different from live hunting, and the Burns committee decided that,
- "it is not possible to lay a trail artificially which simulates fully the subtlety and complexity of the scent left by a fox as it moves through the countryside".
I believe that, in the event of a ban, more farmers would welcome drag and bloodhound packs on to their land, especially if it meant additional revenue through a payment system. That could easily be achieved through subscriptions and the usual social fundraising activities.
Many people enjoy riding in the countryside and are attracted by the social life that hunting can provide but feel unable to take part because of the cruelty currently involved in these so-called "sports". Drag and bloodhound hunting offer a non-controversial way of continuing the traditional aspects of hunting and the pageantry. I am confident that their popularity will increase in the event of a ban as more people feel able to take part.
I also believe that many hunters who claim that they would never take part in drag hunting will feel differently in the event of a ban. It is simply not in their interests to admit that drag hunting would be an acceptable alternative at this stage. On that point, the Burns inquiry concluded that,
- "there would be greater incentive, in the event of a ban, to expand the number of drag and bloodhound packs and the level of participation in both sports".
All sides agree that an important determinant of the economic impact of a hunting ban will be what hunt participants subsequently decide to do with their horses. In recent years, horse ownership has continued to increase against a background of declining numbers of live quarry hunts. Research by Dr. Douglas Macmillan of the University of Aberdeen has shown that data for West Lothian and Midlothian, revealed that in the territory of a hunt that disbanded in 1991, horse numbers have increased faster than in any other area of Scotland.
The case for drag hunting is clear. It removes the cruelty, the element that is opposed by the majority of the British people, and retains the pageantry, tradition, hound packs and social activities. If the hunting community rejects drag hunting as that viable alternative, it then must understand that it leaves itself vulnerable to the charge that a bloodlust does indeed underlie its desperate and otherwise irrational defence of the hunt.
For those of us who want the ban, we must respond imaginatively and sensitively to the fears of the hunting fraternity. For them, a ban is a death-knell, not on the fox, but on a way of life that gives certainty, structure and strength to a community that feels itself harried and hurried and challenged by townies like myself.
We must assure them—and this Government, with their positive rural policies, most strenuously have—that change can reinvigorate and renew their community; that they, like the fox, need not feel threatened by outsiders invading their rural idyll; that to stay the same, they must change with the times; that now is the time to spurn a tradition that has become abhorrent to modern sensibilities. The drag on progress is their failure to embrace the drag hunt.
I support the ban and a better future for all our citizens in England's hunt-free green and pleasant land.
12.42. p.m.
The Lord Bishop of Hereford: My Lords, I share the widespread frustration that we have to devote yet more time to this subject, over which every conceivable fact has been rehearsed countless times and every argument repeatedly deployed.
I believe that the continuation of hunting is vital for the rural economy, for animal welfare, for conservation and for the maintenance of freedom of choice for rural people. I hope that your Lordships will vote today overwhelmingly for the middle way. I believe that this is still politically achievable, as well as being the best option, for a variety of compelling reasons. If something is going to change today, I hope that it will be the votes of some of your Lordships who voted last time for the status quo.
Rural life has suffered grievously over the past year, after several years of severe pressure on farming and a steady loss of jobs and livelihoods in country areas. It is deeply hurtful to rural people to be faced with the threat of a ban on hunting. This is a further blow to a way of life already being battered by urbanisation and globalisation and the increasing separations of town and country in terms of attitudes and ethos. I beg to differ from the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, over that. There really is a difference between town and country attitudes. The vote in the other place last night was very much an urban vote.
When the Curry report is urging the farming community to reconnect with its market, society and the environment, the proposal to ban hunting is particularly damaging and very strongly resented.
We need to be realistic also about animal welfare, especially the welfare of foxes. There is no National Health Service for foxes. There are no retirement homes for elderly foxes. There are no analgesics for ill or injured foxes. The natural world is not a kindly place. Foxes are not kindly in their ways, if and when they gain access to the hen-house.
There is a very dangerous and misguided tendency towards anthropomorphism on the part of many of the most fervent opponents of hunting. This is a tendency which needs to be exposed and is an attitude which needs to be resisted.
However, we do need to acknowledge the real sincerity and passion with which very many people oppose hunting—not a majority despite last night's vote. That is why self-regulation is not a sensible option. I gladly acknowledge what has been achieved by the Independent Supervisory Authority on Hunting. It has been impressive. It includes some significant changes from previous practice in many areas.
Hunts no longer meet in places where they cause road congestion and inconvenience to the general public. Much greater care is exercised to avoid damaging public footpaths or allowing hounds to run across roads and into gardens and public places. Far fewer foxes are being dug out. All this is to be welcomed. It indicates that statutory regulation could be introduced and made to work with no difficulty. It would be a natural and acceptable transition from present practice under well-run hunts to the sort of regulation for which this Bill provides in its second option.
As the noble Lord, Lord Mancroft, pointed out, hunting which has been carried out recently with DEFRA permits, is another form of regulation which has worked well.
We need statutory regulation in order to reassure those people who believe that standards under self-regulation have not been uniformly high and that there have been incidences of malpractice or attitudes of arrogance or discourtesy or indifference to the sensibilities of those who do not share an enthusiasm for hunting. Statutory regulation would be a reasonable way of showing good will and ensuring good practice.
The benefits of regulated hunting are very significant. They sustain a wide variety of rural industries and occupations, of landscape management and nature conservation. They offer a service to farmers in the recovery of fallen stock and in the opportunities provided to young people to develop skills and learn the discipline of the hunt; above all, in providing the least cruel method of controlling the quarry species.
I am grateful, as I am sure are many of your Lordships, for the clear way this has been set out by those veterinary surgeons convinced of the advantages of hunting. They wish it to continue so that it may perform the vital function of enabling the weak, diseased and injured among the quarry population to be humanely despatched. They say that if hunting were to be banned, an uncertain but unacceptably large number of animals would be condemned to a lingering death, through disease, injury, malnutrition or illegal poisoning. Do those who care about animal welfare really want that?
I wish to differ from the noble Lord, Lord Mancroft, in saying that it is not just the perception of cruelty which people find offensive. That is a perception, albeit a misguided one, but there is also the social issue. There is the perception that hunting is indulged in by toffs, which has led to a great deal of jealousy and resentment.
Some of your Lordships will have read the article by Christina Odone in The Observer on March 3rd.
- "The popular prejudice may be of whip-bearing toffs, tally-hoing over hill and dale, but in many rural areas, hunting is like some Chaucerian tale that brings together the Knight, the Wife from Bath and the Parson.
- "When I accompanied the Beaufort Hunt..."
- "..in Gloucestershire, the event proved a blueprint for a Blairite experiment in social inclusion. The hunt attracted a burger van driver from London, a plumber from Burford and a local waitress, as well as a couple of Lords-a-leaping."
The reality is, in most places, with most hunts, that social inclusion is even more comprehensive than with the Beaufort.
Farmers do not need more regulation and more cost. Hunting under licence would inevitably mean some increase in both. However, if that is what is necessary in order to enable hunting to continue—and I believe it is—then I know that farmers will gladly accept it.
I hope that there will be no political-party games this time but a massive vote in favour of the middle way. I speak not only for myself. Last week, there was a residential meeting of the Bishops representing the most deeply rural constituencies. We do not have a three-line Whip; we have a free vote. Every single one of those Bishops agreed with me that the middle way was the right way.
12.50 p.m.
Lord Patten: My Lords, I am most pleased to follow the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Hereford. I have heard him speak on rural matters previously and know that he has always spoken wisdom on stilts. I have never heard him speak on hunting and I agree with everything that he said. I do not seek to damage him in the House of Bishops, but he can now number me among his fan club. His Holiness the Pope has given those of us in my religion no spiritual guidance on the matter, so I shall look to the right reverend Prelate as my spiritual guide and beacon in future years. I do not intend to extend that to all his colleagues on the Bench of Bishops, I hasten to add.
The noble Lord, Lord McNally, is not in his place at the moment, but I suspect that he was right in saying that most things that could be said have been said and that most minds have been made up. I intend to speak as briefly as I can in the interest of voting as early as possible. I shall not repeat what I said in earlier debates, except to say that I have no interest to declare. I do not hunt, shoot or fish, although for as much time as I can I live in what is by any standards deep countryside.
I believe that what looks good is leaving well alone and that the status quo is the best way forward. However, as we have the assurance of the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House that there is no pre-emption, I shall vote in favour of the middle way, but perhaps I may warn my friends in the Countryside Alliance to beware of the smile on the face of the tiger
offering some form of co-operation. I suspect that little by little the smile on the face of the tiger will become wider and broader. In the hope that the Countryside Alliance will be prepared to be as robust as possible, as it has done previously not just in the interests of hunting but of threatened rural minorities at large, I seek to make only three points.My first point relates to the social issue. We heard a lucid and clear speech on the matter from the noble Lord, Lord Harrison. I listened with great care to what he had to say. Speculating on an idea that I cannot prove, he caused me to think about the way in which the hunting of vermin with hounds has developed. As the noble Lord said, it has developed most colourfully, including coats of many different colours and rituals, and there is a certain amount of historic background. I believe that had the hunting of vermin such as foxes or mink developed in the way in which it was done by a few people, without the flashes of pink, scarlet, buff, green or whatever else, the social hackles of people in the countryside, and more predominantly in the towns, would never have been raised against hunting.
I do not pursue country sports, but in my view in my part of the country there is a high measure of social cohesion and hunting locally is most inclusive. As the right reverend Prelate said, people of all shapes, sizes and backgrounds are part of the society in rural areas which supports hunting. I know that many people in rural areas do not support hunting and do not greatly care for it but, in my experience, they do not want to see it banned. Country people are liberal and tolerant and are prepared to rub along with each other in the interests of the social cohesion of the countryside.
My second point is that should this House and another place decide to ban hunting with hounds, there will be no more foxes, mink or other vermin left alive. It is difficult to speak with certainty, but I believe that the necessary putting down of vermin by shooting, trapping and other means, about which others have spoken with more authority, will lead to an increased amount of cruelty in the countryside. If hunting with hounds—or with dogs, as the Motion has it—is not allowed to take place, not only will there be a little more cruelty in the countryside as vermin is dealt with—I seek not to exaggerate—but I believe that attention will turn to other forms of countryside activity. I believe that shooting and fishing will be next.
Then logic draws one inexorably down the route of examining other forms of cruelty. Anyone who has been to an abattoir, a slaughterhouse or a chicken production line knows full well that the animals waiting to be killed know that something at least unusual is about to happen to them and that they can smell something rather rum in the air. I believe that there are some forms of slaughter which are practised today in 21st century Great Britain, particularly in the aid of minorities in the Jewish and Muslim faiths, which have a considerable degree of cruelty attached to them. Yet we do not see anyone much bold enough to come out and say so in comparing arguments about slaughterhouse practices with the arguments about hunting in the field.
Thirdly and finally, I must take issue with the noble Lord, Lord Whitty. He is a stalwart fellow and has sat for many a long hour on the Front Bench debating this and other issues. I cannot agree with him that the debate is not about the rural/urban divide. I spend about half my week in the town, in the City, and about half my week in the countryside. It is clear to me that if hunting with hounds is banned, it will send a terrible signal to a rural minority which is fast diminishing that its legitimate practices are not understood by an overbearing, overweening and overwhelming urban majority. People in the countryside really will begin to feel themselves threatened beyond all belief. Then there may be the explosion of anger that my noble friend Lord Mancroft, with his characteristic good manners, fell just short of predicting, but which I, with greater vulgarity, will predict will happen if the ban takes place.
I say to the House, and through the House to anyone in a minority who is listening, particularly in an unfashionable or politically-incorrect minority; "Do not under any circumstances do anything except be fearful about what will happen to you next, because you will be next".
I now pass on to the noble Baroness, Lady Golding, my uncovenanted minute and look forward to what she has to say.
12.57 p.m.
Baroness Golding: My Lords, I must declare an interest as one of the chairmen of the all-party Middle Way Group. Indeed, it would be fair to say that the Middle Way Group was set up by three MPs, one man and a dog: Peter Luff from the Conservatives; Lembit Opik from the Liberal Democrats; myself from Labour; and Jim Barrington, who used to be chief executive of the League Against Cruel Sports but who left because he did not think that the organisation was involved with preventing cruelty to animals. We had very little money and, as your Lordships proved in the previous vote on hunting in this House, not very much support when we first set up the group.
Following that vote, it would have been easy for us to have gone away and left hunting to its fate. But we did not do that. We decided to set up the committee. We organised, and I chaired, a two-day middle way development committee meeting. We held it in the House of Commons; it was a kind of Select Committee. We invited all the groups we could think of which were involved in the issue of hunting. Some wrote, some attended, and some gave personal evidence. We had evidence from the vets, from the Welsh packs, from the lurcher clubs, from shooting organisations, from the NFU and even from a professor of animal welfare. Many more people attended and gave evidence. The meeting was highly successful, and we hope that your Lordships will take into consideration our revised proposals when voting today.
Our proposals have two key elements: first, a change to the Wild Mammals (Protection) Act 1996 to create a new general offence of causing unnecessary suffering
to wild mammals, as per the original Bill introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Donoughue, to whom I pay tribute; and. secondly, the establishment of a statutory hunting authority. Both of those elements would mean a ban on all uncontrolled and unregulated hunting.As some noble Lords may know, I fly fish, which I have no doubt is a form of hunting, although I do not do it on horseback, wear a red coat or have a dog with me. I must admit that I enjoy it. I pay for a licence, which I obtain from the post office in the Commons and which gives me the right to use a fishing rod and line. But I also need permission from the owner or tenant whose water I want to fish.
There are codes of conduct for all types of fishing. For example, there is a closed season, the recording of fish and restrictions on the kind of fly one can use, the number of fish one can keep and the kind of fish one has to return to the water. One must supply a record of catches to the Environment Agency at the end of the year. Fishermen say, and I agree, that they are the protectors of our water and it is in the interest of their sport to be so. It is in the interests of all hunting sports that people protect the countryside.
All the evidence presented to the middle way committee convinced us that reasonably priced, easily obtained licences with individual codes of conduct like those for fishing would be acceptable to groups who hunt. Many of those groups, such as fox hunting groups, have already set up their own codes.
We, as human beings, have changed the balance of nature in this country. To suggest that we ignore that change is nonsensical. This debate is not about whether we kill wild animals but about how we do it: whether by hunting, poisoning, snaring, gassing or shooting. This debate is not just about fox hunting but about whether we ban all hunting with dogs.
It is about banning ratting. In the area where I live, a group of men went out for a day's ratting with their dogs. They killed 96 rats. Surely, we do not have to tell them that we are going to ban that—first, because they enjoy it; secondly, because they took a dog with them; thirdly, because they killed rats; and, fourthly, because they did not eat them. That is what we are telling fox hunters. Hunting with dogs is surely a more efficient and much safer solution to our rat problem than is the desperately dangerous attempt to control them with poison.
It is also about banning rabbiting with dogs. Yes, we eat them and people in my area who rabbit freeze the surplus to feed their dogs. Do we tell them that in future they must go to the supermarket to buy tinned meat produced from animals farmed and killed by humans because that makes it all right for their dogs to eat? It is nonsense, but perhaps those who support banning should tell that to the rabbits as we snare, shoot and gas them or kill them with the horrible myxomatosis.
My friends would think that I had gone soft if I did not mention that nastiest and most destructive animal in our country today: the mink. The mink is responsible for the decline of our water vole and the devastation of islands off the coast of Scotland where
they have eaten or killed all the ground-nesting birds. They kill for pleasure anything that gets in their way. The only groups that consistently hunt those vicious creatures are mink huntsmen with their mink hounds. Everyone else has given up. When I write to the Ministry to ask what it is going to do, it passes the responsibility to someone else. When I discuss the problem with the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, it does not want to know. The only people who want to do something about destroying mink in this country are the mink hunters with their dogs. Are we now to tell them that we want everyone to give up on that serious problem that threatens our indigenous wildlife?The benefits of the middle way approach are consistent and improved standards of animal welfare; a clear and logical legal framework, with inspectors paid for by the licensing fee; and clear codes of conduct that do not criminalise honest people. The middle way has tried to reach as many people on all sides of the argument as it can. It represents not a pallid compromise but a strong, workable and better way. I hope that when we come to vote, many of your Lordships will follow me into the Lobby.
1.5 p.m.
Lord Renton: My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Golding, has made a most valuable speech, and I am glad that she supports the middle way, as I do. As some of your Lordships will know, I was the Member for Huntingdonshire for 34 years and hunted regularly until I was 70.
What worries me is that if hunting of foxes is abolished, foxes will suffer terribly in ways that they do not suffer at present. If foxes are not hunted, they will multiply and become an even greater menace than they are at present. They are terrible predators, especially for poultry.
I remember being asked by a lady with a country cottage in my constituency to go to see the damage done to the poultry run at the back of her cottage. There she had 16 chickens, of which nine had been killed by a fox that had not attempted to eat any of them. I cite that merely as an example.
If hunting of foxes is abolished, they will have to be destroyed by much more cruel methods than hunting with hounds. There will be only four ways of killing them. The first method is poisoning, which is illegal and horrible. The second method is snaring, which is illegal and even more horrible. I have seen a fox caught in a snare. It must have been there for some hours and was suffering agony. That is illegal. The third method is shooting. People's skill in shooting varies widely. If a fox is shot at, wounded and gets away, I understand that it is likely to die from gangrene, which is a slow and horrible death. The only other way to destroy foxes is by trapping. That is not so cruel, but it is not very effective. Foxes are difficult to entice into traps, so we should not rely too much on that method.
Why, then, is it that I and others say that hunting is less cruel than any of those four methods of killing? Being a lightweight, I was often up front when hounds
closed in on a fox. In my last few seasons, when the anti-hunting movement had really got under way, I decided to count the number of seconds between hounds closing in and the death of the fox. I never counted more than four seconds. So, that is not a very cruel way of killing.There are those who say that just chasing the fox is cruel. I am not so sure about that. There was a distressed look on the face of old foxes, but the chase did not last long and they were killed quickly. I did not see a distressed look on the face of younger foxes. It may be almost irresponsible of me to say it, but I sometimes saw on a fox's face the nearest thing to a grin that I had ever seen. Of course, they were chased for long periods, but, as I said, they were quickly killed. When chased, foxes did not suffer the agony that, generally, they would suffer if killed by any of the other methods.
Townspeople do not know about such things. They should realise that abolishing the hunting of foxes will cause more cruelty to foxes.
1.11 p.m.
Lord Livsey of Talgarth: My Lords, it is a great pleasure to participate in the debate. Unlike the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, I believe that there is a difference between urban and rural views on the issue. There is a split between campaigners on the issue of whether the hunting of foxes with hounds or dogs should be banned.
On the whole, rural people wish to keep hunting going, and urban people appear to favour a ban on hunting, although that is not borne out by recent opinion polls. I declare an interest as someone who has always lived in the countryside. I was partly brought up on a small farm. I have been a farm worker, a farm manager, an agricultural economist and educationalist and a small farmer. I have never tried to force my rural views on city and town dwellers. However, urban views on hunting are being forced on rural people, who are a minority. Ignorance of rural life has never deterred those who campaign for a fox hunting ban. Sadly, an urban/rural divide exists.
In rural Wales, we must put up with some of the worst aspects of urban culture. For example, two weeks ago, a high-speed motorcyclist was prosecuted because he had been travelling at 160 miles per hour on country lanes. The evidence for that was provided by his own video camera on his motorbike; it displayed 160 mph. Rightly, he was banned, but we suffer incursions of motorcyclists travelling everywhere at 120 mph every weekend. They come from Birmingham, Liverpool, Shrewsbury, Bristol and south Wales. They are rightly condemned, but they are there.
Drugs come into our rural areas, and there are distribution networks. Only yesterday, a gang appeared in court in connection with a multi-million pound operation, bringing drugs into rural towns and villages. Such activity has an extreme effect on young rural people. Crime has spread from the cities to rural areas. Cottages and houses can lose all their slates
overnight. The slates are sold in cities with no questions asked. Quad bikes, chainsaws, antiques and even four-wheel drives and livestock trailers disappear. City slickers are ready to market all that loot. Dyfed-Powys Police have just over 1,000 officers. They have the best detection rates in the United Kingdom, but even they have some difficulty in coping with such activity.Decent urban people, when informed of the mayhem, are, naturally, horrified. They say, understandably, that such acts are not typical; nor is the worst behaviour ascribed to hunts. It is hardly surprising that, when told by city dwellers that fox hunting must be banned, country people ask, "Who are you to tell us what we can do, when many of you abandon your dogs on the streets? That is immoral, as are the other crimes perpetrated by urban people in the countryside". I hasten to add that the people committing crimes are a minority, but the majority seems unable, for various reasons, to control them.
Livestock farming is an unending, relentless battle against the weather, the politicians and the pests. Sometimes, in the pubs, country dwellers, in their laconic way, say that it is difficult to distinguish between the last two. On every farm that I have managed—my own farm of 65 acres, a college farm of 350 acres, a Scottish estate of 1,500 acres—the fox has been a pest. My worst experience was the loss, one spring, of 37 young lambs. Twenty-nine of them were left headless and torn apart, killed for the fun of it by foxes. That was from a 200-ewe flock that had been shepherded outside at midnight and 5 a.m.
Foxes must be controlled but not eliminated. If the fox population is kept in balance, there will be a balance of all species, wild and farmed, in the countryside, and that will remain stable. I am a former Member of Parliament for Brecon and Radnorshire, the largest constituency in England and Wales—87 miles long by 45 miles wide—where there are 16 sheep to every one person. There are many Welsh packs, and nine hunts operate in my former constituency. Many are foot packs, which are vital for fox control, as are gun packs, in the mountainous and deeply forested areas, for example, the Cambrian mountains. Those nine hunts kill 2,000 foxes annually. They keep the fox population stable and have done so every year for the past 30 years. The main problem in controlling foxes is the imposition of monoculture forestry. Fir trees offer excellent cover for foxes.
On the whole, hunts are well supervised. However, the general public need reassurance, and hunting practices need to come under a measure of control. The case for hunting under licence—the middle way—must be pursued. The other option—a ban—is out of the question. It would result in an explosion of the fox population and the ravaging of the lamb crop every spring, with terrible consequences for animal welfare. That view is backed by most of the veterinary profession.
The solution must be a balance between, on the one hand, liberty, tolerance of others and the survival of a lifestyle and, on the other, a set of rules that will take into account concerns for animal welfare and the well-being of those who live in the countryside. In a nutshell, that means a respect for animal welfare, the rural economy and the environment. Here I speak for my Welsh colleagues, the noble Lords, Lord Hooson, Lord Geraint, Lord Carlile of Berriew and Lord Thomas of Gresford.
I pay tribute to my colleague in the House of Commons, the honourable Member for Montgomeryshire, Lembit O pik, who has done tremendous work on the matter. With his colleagues, he has evolved a radically different approach. There is a guarantee of an improvement in animal welfare; a guarantee of balance; and a guarantee that human liberty will be protected. The alternative—banning the hunting of foxes—would mean that uncontrolled, unregulated killing would occur. There is no longer majority public support for a ban.
These proposals would amend the Wild Mammals (Protection) Act 1996 by creating the new offence of causing unnecessary suffering to wild animals, which would be a big improvement in the Act's current provisions. They would also result in the creation of a statutory hunting authority which would be appointed by the Secretary of State and include people from many different backgrounds. The authority would enforce codes of conduct, create licensed hunts and be funded by the sale of licences—which would themselves be affordable and readily obtainable. Codes of conduct would be policed for breaches, and licence holders would be subject to inspection. If a hunt did not have a licence, a £5,000 fine would ensue. The proposals would undoubtedly result in improved animal welfare standards, a clear and logical legal framework, and controls on hare coursing. They would also address the concerns expressed in the Burns report about fox control matters.
The alternative—a ban on fox hunting—would criminalise farmers and rural dwellers who have to protect their own livestock, and that would be a serious incursion on their liberties. A ban would deny to a minority the human right to protect their own livestock. Parliament's record on protecting basic civil liberties would be besmirched if we chose that alternative.
I believe that it is possible to reach a compromise on this issue, and that it is to be found in the middle way set of proposals. I shall oppose a ban and support those proposals. They are the best option from every point of view.
1.21 p.m.
Lord Plumb: My Lords, in the past few days, many people have told me that they think it is positively obscene—yesterday, my daughter telephoned me and said precisely the same—that we are spending seven hours debating this issue today when we are surrounded by so many problems that should be debated. I am sure that the Minister will agree that he
could be spending his time a little better than sitting here listening to this debate. I am not an active hunting man and I never have been, but I am a supporter and I always have been. I am also a countryman. Above all, I am a firm believer in people's right to enjoy country pursuits. I therefore totally oppose a ban on hunting. Nevertheless, I am prepared to consider joining others in supporting the middle way.The other night, and for obvious reasons, the masters of my own hunt, the Atherstone, in North Warwickshire, came to see me. Richard and Penny Tyacke are family farmers who are up at 4 a.m. to do their chores and feed their livestock before they can have a day's hunting. It is therefore a total myth that only those who can easily afford it become involved in hunting. They told me that, this year, compared with two years ago, twice as many people are following the hunt. I think that that speaks for itself. Moreover, many of the supporters pay by instalment because they cannot pay the full amount during the season. They also include five doctors, some North Warwickshire miners and local families who enjoy a day's access to the countryside.
As others—not least my noble friend Lord Patten—have said, if we completely banned hunting with dogs, there would be a cry to ban fishing, all hunting and other country pursuits. I was born in a mining village. I can assure the House that, if we banned hunting with dogs, the outcry from that part of the world would be absolutely deafening in condemnation of those who they believe have taken away what they believe is their English tradition. The issue is about human rights and people's freedom to enjoy watching and participating in a well-organised and disciplined sport. As others have said, through the ages, fox hunting has set a fine example to all sportsmen, above all to respect the land that they hunt. Many of their supporters have occupied and farmed that land, and they respect those codes of conduct. My own son, at Wye College, led the beagles for a couple of seasons. When I teased him about the hares that he did not kill during the course of a season, he said to me, "This is not about killing hares. It's about hunting and managing the pack. It's about discipline in the countryside".
Well-established hunts are recognised well beyond the countryside. I have a new point to raise with the Minister. I have been reminded by my good friend and neighbour, a retired captain in the Royal Navy, that, in the Second World War, thousands of men served in His Majesty's ships named after and affiliated to the British hunts. They were known as hunt-class destroyers. For those who served in them, those ships were their homes, and in many cases their graves. There was a warm relationship—I speak from experience in this—between those who were in the ships and their hunting friends. The latter were generous in providing comforts for the sailors.
Destroyers included the "Beagle", the "Foxhound", the "Greyhound" and the "Hunter". One flat minesweeper was named the "Hound". Yes, there was also an HMS "Fox". Even today, the names of a class of mine-countermeasure vessel refer to the hunts, even
to my own Atherstone hunt. Will the Minister tell us whether all those names are to be changed to satisfy political correctness? Today, we watch films in which two or three predators chase and kill innocent animals in the field. Does the Broadcasting Standards Commission receive complaints about that from animal rights activists, or is what we see on film all right because it occurs more than 3,000 miles away?I am sure that the Minister will accept that a total ban on hunting would only add to the current economic crisis in rural areas with which he is so familiar. Such a consequence is the last thing that farmers and those involved in rural businesses such as tourism need. The Government may insist on proceeding with a certain type of legislation for their own political reasons, but—as the noble Lord, Lord Burns, concluded in his excellent report—the animal welfare case for doing so is far from compelling. What is needed, in the British tradition, is moderation and tolerance, not more red tape or bureaucracy.
The Burns report also concluded that it is necessary for man to manage the population of the species—in this case, the fox species. The use of dogs to hunt mammals, particularly foxes, makes a vital contribution to pest control across the country. As we speak, I can almost see the fox licking his lips as the lambs are being born. The report also acknowledges the important fact that hunts provide vital services to farming, including—as my noble friend Lady Byford said—the removal of fallen stock. The loss of that service would be a new imposition on the whole of the livestock industry and one which it can ill afford. A ban would also have knock-on implications, including—as the noble Lord, Lord Donoughue, said—the possible loss of 10,000 to 13,000 jobs.
The challenge for the Minister, his team in DEFRA, and everyone involved in or concerned about rural industries is to address the wide range of pressing issues highlighted in the Curry commission report on the future of food and farming. Those issues will have to be tackled to secure a sustainable, long-term future for the industry.
I suggest that those challenges are substantial enough without adding further restrictions to control pests and driving a wedge, as has been said, between town and country. In his foreword to the rural White Paper, the Deputy Prime Minister said that that was not government policy. I hope that he and the Government will stand by that.
1.30 p.m.
Lord Palmer: My Lords, oh, dear! Here we go again. I must declare an interest as a resident of Scotland and being married, as of last Friday, to a redundant master of foxhounds. I shudder to think what she has spent in time, emotion and worry trying to make Members of the Scottish Parliament listen to the argument. A lot has already been said on both sides of the debate. Therefore, my contribution will be brief.
This time last year, when the country was in the grip of foot and mouth disease, it really was ironic that DEFRA enlisted the help of hunt servants to help
eradicate the disease. Those same hunt servants are having their very livelihoods put at risk by single issue Back-Benchers who do not have the capacity to concern themselves with the real issues facing the country. As other noble Lords have said, it must be education, transport and the beleaguered National Health Service that matter, not foxes.Only yesterday the Daily Telegraph ran a headline, "Street crime spiralling out of control, admits Blunkett". I believe that political commentators will look back in 20 years' time on all the parliamentary time wasted discussing foxes in utter disbelief.
I believe that there are lessons to be learnt from the hunting fiasco in Scotland. The Scottish Parliament has set a damaging constitutional precedent by ignoring the findings of its own rural development committee. That committee spent 15 months taking evidence concluding that it would be,
- "difficult or impossible to amend the Bill into a form which would adequately meet the aim of ending cruelty and for this reason recommends that the general principles of this Bill should not be agreed to.
My local police force in the Borders, from where most of the hunts in Scotland operate, stated that
- "A ban is almost unworkable . . . because the legislation is not clear".
It must be wrong for Parliament to put in jeopardy a hitherto legal way of life. The real irony is that a ban will not save the life of one single fox. As a result of the Bill in Scotland, foxes will undoubtedly suffer a far more cruel death by indiscriminate shooting, trapping, poisoning and gassing. In these times of real voter apathy, can the Motions before us be considered fully democratic? I fear not. As one national newspaper recently led, "Let us have a Bill to ban banning". I urge your Lordships to vote "no" against a ban, "yes" for the middle way and "yes" for the third option.
1.35 p.m.
Lord Boardman: My Lords, I shall not attempt to follow up the reference to hunting in Scotland made by the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, except to say that it may not be intelligible to them; it is certainly not intelligible to us. We have sympathy for the vast problem they have. Let us ensure that we do not go that way in this country.
I must first declare an interest. I have lived and hunted in the Pytchley country for over 60 years. I have hunted with that pack and with neighbouring packs. In the 60 years I have hunted I have never seen anything which I can condemn as cruelty in any shape or form. I would still be hunting but for the fact that my wife and my doctor told me not to.
One has to be lucky to be close enough to see the lead hound snip the neck of a fox and kill it instantly. On the few occasions on which I have seen the killing of a fox, it is clear that that is how it is done. In the photographs much publicised by anti-hunt papers and periodicals, one is presented with the fox being torn to pieces by the hounds. The noble Lord, Lord Harrison, who is not in his place, seemed to suggest that he has seen foxes killed by being torn to pieces. I defy any noble Lord to claim that he has ever seen a fox killed in a hunt by being torn to pieces. I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Renton, made the same comment on a previous occasion.
All forms of nature have a degree of cruelty. A cat chasing a mouse is one of the most cruel events one can watch. If one has to put an end to it somehow, one must get hold of the mouse and kill it. In foxhunting I have never had cause to see anything remotely cruel. Foxes cause much cruelty by killing lambs. Farmers today are under great pressure at lambing time because of the number of lambs they will lose. Foxhunting has been under some control for months. Therefore, there are now more foxes slaughtering lambs than previously.
The alternatives to hunting are shooting, poisoning, trapping and snaring. I find those immensely cruel. They cause ghastly consequences, particularly poisoning. They are the alternatives. If a ban is imposed the result will be massive cruelty to foxes which, as a result, will be exterminated over a period by shooting, trapping, snaring, and poisoning. That is something to which I hope none of us will ever agree, accept or support.
The alternative to that is option three, hunting under supervision, which is very much hunting as it is now. I believe that a good master of foxhounds will ensure the most effective discipline in his hounds. That would be far more effective than government regulation. He will see that hunting is carried out without cruelty. I accept that the present mood of Parliament is not to agree to hunting under supervision but to go for the middle way, hunting under licence. In the circumstances, I accept that, provided that the conditions and regulations imposed are reasonable, fair and practicable, and proposed for the continuity of permanent hunting under that system so that it can be controlled unspoilt for the benefit of the fox, the sheep and the hen hereafter. Therefore, I accept that. I believe that it is the right course to adopt today. There needs to be a careful look at the controls and conditions which are imposed in order to enable the countryside's sport activity and control of pests to continue. Hunting should continue as in the past but with suitable discipline, control or licence.
1.40 p.m.
Lord Plant of Highfield: My Lords, I have not spoken in previous debates about hunting. I want to speak today in support of the middle way proposal, so eloquently stated by my noble friend Lady Golding in what I thought was an absolutely terrific speech. In a sense I have little to add to it. But, following the injunction of the noble Lord, Lord McNally, I shall nevertheless do so.
I have never hunted. It is about the last thing in the world I would ever want to do. I am an inveterate urbanite. I get worried when pavements stop and coffee shops cease to be. I do not much like being in the open country. I like streets and facilities. Normally, I am racked with anxiety when faced with a political decision about what I should think and how I should vote. Nevertheless, despite my background of not being a country dweller, I have been quite certain all the way through the debates that have gone on since 1997 that hunting should not be banned. That has always seemed to be absolutely clear cut. I should like to explain why.
In some ways the defenders of hunting have done themselves a disservice. I can understand why they have done it; nevertheless, I think that it is a disservice. They have tended to emphasise a great deal the links between hunting, a traditional way of life, the local community and so on. There are some fine evocations of all of this in English literature. My friend and political opponent, Professor Roger Scruton, has often written about this kind of thing, about the way in which hunting and community and so forth are linked.
That is not an argument that will cut much ice with the urban population because they might just think, well, there are lots of forms of community life in Britain which have been undercut by economic and social changes—mining and fishing communities—so why should rural communities somehow be preserved indefinitely in a kind of aspic? One can understand people who live in rural communities wanting to emphasise all those kinds of reasons for valuing hunting as part of community life. But that will not be all that powerful in terms of trying to persuade other people that hunting should continue. What those who defend hunting need to do is to try to link the practice of hunting with reasons that people outside the rural areas who have never lived in a rural community can appreciate, understand and endorse. That points directly to justification of hunting as a form of pest control. It is something everyone understands and has nothing to do with arguments about sustaining local communities. It is about a particular way of controlling a pest. There is no doubt that foxes are pests. They will be killed. Indeed, they should be killed for all the reasons that we have heard today.
If we see hunting as a form of pest control—albeit rather upmarket pest control, with Gilbert and Sullivan elements attached to it, but nevertheless a form of pest control ultimately—then what are the appropriate ways of doing the killing? Is it by hunting? Is it by shooting, poisoning, snaring and so forth? I shall not add to all the points that have been made. It
seems to me clear as a pikestaff that hunting is no more, and probably less, cruel that those other ways of killing foxes.Yesterday morning an animal welfare campaigner said on the "Today" programme that there could be no compromise with cruelty. So if it turned out on investigation—as I think the inquiry of the noble Lord, Lord Burns, showed—that these other methods of killing foxes are as cruel as fox hunting, does that mean that there can be no compromise with those as well? The attention of animal welfare people will then turn towards trying to ban other methods of killing foxes on the grounds that they are equally cruel. The logic of the situation would seem to imply precisely that.
The same person also argued that cruelty is indivisible. It may well be. But if we regard killing foxes with hounds as cruel, then, as my noble friend Lady Golding said, what about rats, for instance? I understand that rodents are excluded. After seeing the television programme mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, it seems to me that rats are killed in almost exactly the same way by small dogs as are foxes by hounds. So will the next focus be banning the killing of rats with dogs? If cruelty is indivisible and if killing foxes with hounds is cruel—
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