KEEP THE BAN

   After the general election, I posted a blog post sharing my discomfort about the Tory win and mentioned two things in the Conservative manifesto that I was not looking forward to. These being the repeal of the Hunting Act and the development of Trident and war machinery. Never could I have imagined that two months later, my friends and I would be outside Downing Street campaigning to stop Parliament repealing the Act. We attended on Wednesday 15th July, the day the Act was going to be voted in Parliament, however due to the success of the campaign the day before, David Cameron had called off the vote. This humiliation for Cameron was caused by the fact that SNP MP’s vowed they would vote against them to keep the ban in place despite it not affecting Scottish laws. Almost immediately after, the Tories tried to update their English Votes for English Laws plan in the hope that when the Act is next pushed through for a vote, the SNP won’t be there to defeat the Tories. What a weak move by Cameron.

Banner at the campaign - photo by me

   On the day of the event it is fair to say that the turn out was admirable, however I believe that had David had not cancelled the vote early the day before, the turn out would have been colossal. This previous success the day before, meant we were there to show continued support for the campaign and to show Cameron that it would not be easy to shake animal welfare campaigners. A range of motivational speakers, including Dominic Dyer the CEO of Badger Trust, a local MP and other activists, encouraged the support and opened my eyes to a subject I was previously unconsciously naive about. I thought I knew the majority of what the campaign was going to be about but when you are presented with facts and real life situations, it’s amazing what you can learn. This bloodsport has to stop. Foxes are shot for no reason than for sport. The fact that hunters use the excuse of ‘foxes are killing more chickens and sheep’ and that it has now been proven as untrue, with foxes being less than 1 per cent of reason of why these animals die, shows the barbaric and medieval nature of this activity. In the UK, 80 per cent of people are in support of the ban so why is this something the Tories feel the need to change. In todays day and age, why is the hunting of a wild animal considered a ‘normal’ hobby amongst considerable numbers of people? In 50 years time we will look back at this moment and be dumbfounded by the stupidity of hunting and the inhumane nature of it. I only pray that in 5 years time when it comes to the end of the Conservative term in Parliament, the Act will not have been repealed and that hunting is not something that people will think is a regular activity.

My friend and I at the campaign with our banner

   If you would like to join the half a million people who have already signed the petition and show support for continuing the ban on fox hunting then please find the link here.

   The Twitter page to the official Keep the Ban campaign can be found here.

#KEEPTHEBAN