Hunting and field sports

Sir, – I write on behalf of approximately 270 hunt clubs across this island, and thousands of their members, to condemn in the strongest terms the conflation of illegal deer-hunting with lawful field sports by John Fitzgerald (April 20th).

As Mr Fitzgerald well knows there is simply no comparison between the reckless criminality of gangs of poachers trespassing on lands where deer might be present and the traditional pursuits of foxhunting and beagling which are a strand interwoven in the fabric of our rural society going back hundreds of years. Hunt clubs bring both economic and social benefits to their localities and are every bit as much a feature of the cultural landscape as the GAA, soccer or boxing clubs.

But then I suspect that while Mr Fitzgerald professes to be concerned about illegal poaching, his real objective is the denigration of field sports and the consequent deligitimisation of hunting in the eyes of the general public – thus creating fertile political ground for a ban in years to come.

If that is so, then he should take heed of the lessons learned from Great Britain where a ban on hunting, railroaded through the House of Commons by Tony Blair’s Labour government, in the teeth of fierce resistance from the field sports community, has now proved to be completely unworkable. Case after case brought against hunt clubs by the Crown Prosecution Service and a politicised RSPCA has collapsed in legal farce as the wording of the law has rendered it more or less unenforceable. And foxes have been culled in even greater numbers by rifle bullet.

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Indeed David Cameron, the Conservative Party leader, has recognised this situation for what it really is – a total shambles – and has made a manifesto commitment to allowing a free vote on repeal if returned to office after the general election. There is every likelihood such a vote would be successful.

I trust our own politicians will have drawn similar conclusions from the British experience and devote their time and effort to matters of much more pressing urgency to the Irish electorate. In the meantime I would ask anybody with knowledge of those involved in illegal poaching to share it with the Garda Síochána immediately. – Yours, etc,

PHILIP DONNELLY,

Director,

Hunting with Hounds,

FACE Ireland,

Clane, Co Kildare.