Nigel Farage condemns Labour’s newest assault on the countryside | Politics | News | EUROtoday

Nigel Farage has condemned Labour’s newest battle on the countryside and rural life as “authoritarian”, as the federal government pledges to abolish beloved Boxing Day hunts.

Ministers are set to ban path searching, a authorized and harm-free observe that sees hunt canine chase after the scent of a fox relatively than the actual animal.

The observe was introduced in following Tony Blair’s ban on fox searching in 2004, and is usually a serious group occasion in rural areas.

Nigel Farage has blasted Labour’s pledged crackdown, branding the federal government “control freaks”.

The Reform UK chief, who attends his annual hunt in Kent yearly, fumed: “So now Labour wants to ban trail hunting.

“You may as nicely ban strolling canine within the countryside as they chase rabbits, hares, deer and foxes.

“Labour are authoritarian control freaks.”

Tim Bonner, chief govt of the Countryside Alliance: “Animal rights activists have spent 20 years making increasingly spurious claims about the legal activity of hunts without any evidential basis. Trail hunting is a legal activity which supports hundreds of jobs and is central to many rural communities.

“Especially after its assault on household farms, the federal government must be specializing in addressing points that really assist rural communities thrive, relatively than pursuing divisive insurance policies that hinder them.

“The government’s own figures show that more people have been convicted under the Hunting Act than any other piece of wildlife legislation, although only a tiny proportion of those relate to registered hunts.

“However unjustified it’s, the legislation clearly works. There is totally no purpose to revisit it aside from Labour’s persevering with obsession.”

Left-wing animal rights activists have claimed that foxes are still killed by dogs during trail hunting, though there is little evidence of this.

Labour’s animal welfare minister Baroness Hayman claimed there is also evidence that trail hunting is used as a “smokescreen” by hunters, which is “not acceptable”.

The RSPCA’s Thomas Schultz-Jagow welcomed the announcement, saying: “Every 12 months, wild animals, pets and horses undergo while being chased and killed by packs of hounds on path hunts whereas rural communities endure delinquent behaviour and intimidation.

“There is mounting evidence that, since the Hunting Act came into force in 2004, ‘legal’ trail hunting is being used as a smokescreen to illegally hunt with dogs. This has made enforcement of the Hunting Act extremely challenging for the authorities.”