Hunt supporters are dinosaurs of politics
I FEEL that Colin Richey should get his facts right before putting pen to paper, Daft hunting act must be repealed, Points of view, March 7.
The Countryside Alliance relentlessly pumps out the message that hunting is more popular than ever before, more people are going out and so on and so on. But in the Westcountry last week when interviewed, the hunters and related businesses said they were having a terrible time of it. Stabling and livery fees down, hunt income down. Well both stories can't be right, can they?
The hunters are seeking to claim that the law isn't working, but it is blindingly obvious that if what they are now doing is legal, then quite clearly the law is working. Of course if their complaint is really that they are breaking the law and that is what they mean by the law "not working", that would be a different matter. But surely the hunters, through their own Countryside Alliance, are not claiming that they are all out there breaking the law. Or are they?
Then of course, there are the rumours in Parliament that the hunters are being taken for a ride by the Conservative Party fundraisers. The rumour being that David Cameron's fundraisers are quite keen on the hunters' money and hunters delivering leaflets in the constituencies, but the party itself has no intention of upsetting the majority of its potential voters by getting involved in the hunting debate again just to turn the clock back to cruelty for a few manic bloodsports enthusiasts.
Of course, the hunting hounds in the Conservative Party will insist that repeal is a done deal and will be running around saying "trust David, he is one of us". But the cold political reality is that no new Government following an election held on the back of a financial crisis could credibly devote Parliamentary time to debating the hunting issue again.
Of course, there will be those who would like them to drop everything and bring back animal abuse for sport but they are the dinosaurs of politics, their time has passed and our modern society moved on.
Hunting may be popular among the few, but it is a real turn off for the many. A potential front bench full of people given to weekend animal killing will be about as popular as a dead fish in the air conditioning system. The smell of corruption would taint all those even remotely associated with it.
While the hunters long for their clocks to go back, the reality is that over the last few years they have in fact engineered their own demise.
If the hunters have been obeying the law for the last few years, clearly the Hunting Act is working! Or do they now admit to being gangs of criminals putting two fingers up to the law?
Kathy Moyle
East Budleigh
(by post)
Comments
by Doc, Torre
Saturday, March 14 2009, 12:15PM
“To win the next election the Conservative Party must make significant in-roads into urban and suburban constituencies. Most opinion polls suggest that urban voters are opposed to hunting for sport, and would reject any political party that had the reintroduction of hunting as a clear manifesto pledge. While hunting may be a core issue amongst a minority of rural voters, these are the electors that will most likely remain loyal to the Tories - particularly as the threat from UKIP appears to be diminishing. Indeed, research indicates that, as rural populations change due to population growth and incomers from urban areas, support for hunting in its traditional form will continue to decline even in its heartlands
However, to maintain their support among the - predominantly - affluent pro-hunting lobby, the Conservatives have promised a 'free vote' on the issue if they are elected. Significantly, this is not a commitment to change the law. Since, new Conservative MPs will be based in urban constituencies and from a different generation than their Tory predecessors, their automatic support for hunting is less likely, even if they form a sizable majority.
In short, a Conservative government would not necessarily see the reintroduction of hunting as a priority, but will likely work to sideline the issue as an unnecessary distraction from the real issues of economic and social dislocation. Whether a new Government decides to discourage investigations and prosecutions is another matter.”