NEWS: Britain Outlaws Fox Hunting

The House of Commons won a standoff with the House of Lords and has outlawed fox hunting in England and Wales. The House activated the seldom used 1949 Parliament Act to force the ban into law. This came on the heels of the Lords rejecting a compromise on the law. Several hundred protestors were seen outside of Windsor Castle where the Queen and French president Chirac are scheduled to have a banquet





Im not really sure where I stand on this issue. It�s a time honored British custom and unless the foxes are endangered its seems alright to me. However, it hunting for pure sport and the mead is not edible (or at least no one wants too) I know the animal activists will point out that the foxes are killed by the dogs, but what exactly happens in the wild? There are no old foxes homes for them to retire into.

It's a tradition we could do without.

The fox hunting issue is our gay marriage issue. A totally irrelevant and petty distraction.

I suppose I support the ban but I wasn't really bothered about it either way like most people were until it was seized on by the media and turned into an almost fashionable (for both sides) cause celebre.

The thing that really pissed me off about it was the sheer trumped up sense of indignancy that a small segment of the pro hunt people went about protesting the ban, acting as if it was the single greatest affront to civil rights in history. People that wouldn't dream of protesting anything remotely serious or that actually affected the rights of other people threw themselves into this issue with the zeal of some kind of modern-day suffragettes, mostly because they couldn't believe this kind of thing (a law) was being forced on them. That�s all right for the plebs, but not for us!

The kind of people who wouldn't bat an eye if euthanasia programs for the homeless were introduced. Moral and social hypocrites.

Wow...

I, for one, can't immagine the jollies one would get over huting little "rat-dogs", lol. I mean, it's just cruel. Those Animal Protestors always have the last say !

Deep

Tradition runs deep in the Country here in the UK, hunts have been around from before the signing of the Magna Carta, but yes in this day and age hunting no longer has a place in a modern society.
What we have to remember though is although Hunting with dogs is thought of as barbaric by the main stream, the people who actually do the Hunts have done so for generation upon generation and for them it is the loss of a way of life and of a tradition that goes back for over a 1000 years

Yeah Kegs is right, People from the countryside were breaking into parliment and throwing themselves about, chaining themselves to fences outside etc and generally tried to make it out has if its the biggest change in law in the history of this country.

The bill was forced through the house of lords using the 1949 parliment act.
Basically the law was voted in by the house of commons(Voted parliment members) 3 times, and was rejected by the house of lords(Unvoted/rich Parliment members) 3 times. The parliment act allows the house of commons to stick its middle finger up at the house of lords and allow the will of the voted people through AFTER the bill has been rejected 3 times by the house of lords.

Now hunt protesters are going to claim the parliment act is illegal and somehow there claiming its a human rights issue. Basically they'll attempt to destory an important part of our law making process JUST to get there own way.
Its pathetic really, because most of the country either A) Doesn't give a damn about the hunt law or B) Wants it banned anyway so could care less

Well it's good to see traditions can be broken...

But for the British gov to push this so hard they must have been hurting for something to distract the populace with. Makes me wonder what blairs motivation is on this one.
I'd like to jump up and down and say that's a kick in the eye for the bourgeois but I'm suspicious.
Still, the foxes must be pleased

So I can understand this, where is Blair? When i see him speaking in debate is it at the House of Commons or Lords? Who decides who makes up the Lords? Is it a birth right? If they can overridden using the 1949 Act, what is the point of them?

Wow, I sit down at my computer with my morning tea and toast and see this! I must say it took me by suprise...The first proper debate I ever took part in was on fox hunting (me being against) and I wiped the floor with them; not because I'm a good debator, but because the arguments for, in the end, were poor in comparison. It's a happy day!

FredT, Blair's in the house of commons, the Lords bit well I can't remember (something to do with the constitution ) and as a politician, they can nearly always find loop holes! Ok I think I'm right with all of that, hey only started politics in September so ya know...

[edit on 19-11-2004 by LadyCool21]

Originally posted by FredT
So I can understand this, where is Blair? When i see him speaking in debate is it at the House of Commons or Lords? Who decides who makes up the Lords? Is it a birth right? If they can overridden using the 1949 Act, what is the point of them?

Blair can only speak in the House of Commons, the Lords traditionaly are madde up of Peers, Lords, Barons etc, and are there through birth. But in recent Centuries there have been more and more "Political" Lords, i.e. none hereditary Lords that were made so by the Queen on the recomendation of the incumbant Primeminister. A good example would be Niel Kinnock ( ex labour party leader ) and Jeff Archer ( ex Convict lol )
The Lords have the right, how they get the right god only knows, to over rule Parliment if they dissagree with something that the Commons tries to vote into Law.

Finally I can travel to Britain without fear of being shot.

At least, I'm told I am quite the fox.

Originally posted by Majic
Finally I can travel to Britain without fear of being shot.

At least, I'm told I am quite the fox.

Heh heh in the uk we shoot Rabbits ......... for Foxes we just let the dogs rip them to bits in an orgy of blood letting, id wait until next year to pay us a visit though, i dont think it a full law yet.

Know1 has a god given right to take any life, foxes or human. This is long overdue and I think the genral british public will agree. It makes me laugh because now those people who used to go on 'The Hunt' are about to become the 'Hunted' by the law makers of our land......they seem mightily pissed off that the situation has been reversed, I think in a small way they are being tought a lesson of what its like to be hunted out of your home and natural surrounding, this is karma taking effect and Im loving every minute of it.

Is it a total ban on fox hunting? or just hunting with dogs? I havent really read the fine print. As far as I was to believe it was a total ban.

THe reason why farmers would hate it is during lambing season, when quite often the first thing a lamb sees "during" the process of being born is a fox latching its self on the lambs face and eating said pieces, that was the last thing the lamb saw. Not a pretty thing to watch and a bane on the economy, as there will soon be an over population of foxes all doing the same thing. Then you get alot more foxes around residential areas. Going thru rubbish bins, killing the odd pet etc......hmmmm maybe a small child in the back yard sitting on a blanket eating an ice cream? what will hungry Mr fox do here?........ get the picture?

But looking at the way they hunt the foxes, with men on horseback and a pack of dogs, hardly strikes me as an efficient way to keep the population in check. Is the fox population a problem?

The fox population in the uk is not a problem and hasnt been for many hundreds of years, who knows if the ban on hunting would actually mean a large rise in the number of foxes? With the rapid urbanisation of so much of the green fields of the Uk, the foxes may never get a chance to become an endemic problem. If however this did happen, then I could recomment nearly 40 more humane ways to deal with them if they became pests or a danger to people or livestock.

The right to hunt groups are not going to go away quietly and are planning on taking the ban to court.

LONDON (AP) - Defeated in Parliament, British hunting supporters looked to the courts Friday to uphold their right to chase foxes.

Some hunting supporters have threatened to disobey a new hunting ban after it takes effect on Feb. 18. But the Countryside Alliance, which staged mass demonstrations in the losing battle, said it would go to court to try to overturn the law. The House of Commons asserted its supremacy on Thursday by enacting the ban on hunting with dogs in England and Wales over the obdurate opposition of the House of Lords.

Legal paperwork was being completed Friday morning and "we will be going this afternoon almost certainly," Tim Bonner, spokesman for the Countryside Alliance, said.

The case would argue that the Parliament Act was not applied properly, Bonner said. If that fails, he said the Alliance planned a second challenge arguing that the law violated human rights.
Court

Trying to save foxes, or improve the lives of foxes, is a noble idea. This ban, however, will achieve neither. Foxes will still be controlled, and that will be done using poisioning, trapping and shooting (none of which are addressed in this bill). At least the foxes hunted with dogs have a decent chance of getting away, and it's usually the old/sick that don't make it; this a recreates natural law that is otherwise missing: natural predators.

Foxes aren't the cuddly animals they appear to be; they are vicious killers, and will kill more than they need to eat. I've seen this with my own eyes; 5 of our chickens slaughtered, only one of which was carried away to be eaten. People with small livestock consider them vermin, although no one wants to see them wiped out, as they're an intergral part of the natural order of things.

Here's what I can't understand: why would a person who believes in "animal rights" (a stupid idea, IMHO, as rights require responsibility..."freedom from unecessary suffering" is a more realistic ideal)...anyway, why would such a person choose foxes as the first target of opportunity? Because one thing is irrefuatable: your average fox enjoys a MUCH better life than any battery hen, veal calf, or intensively-raised pig. Why not tackle the real injustice first??

The next logical target would be abandoned & mistreated pets.

The truth behind this whole thing comes down to class hatred and a pathetic desire to force one group's (questionable) moral code on another group.

Originally posted by Azeari of the Radiant Eye
Trying to save foxes, or improve the lives of foxes, is a noble idea. This ban, however, will achieve neither. Foxes will still be controlled, and that will be done using poisioning, trapping and shooting (none of which are addressed in this bill). At least the foxes hunted with dogs have a decent chance of getting away, and it's usually the old/sick that don't make it; this a recreates natural law that is otherwise missing: natural predators.

Foxes aren't the cuddly animals they appear to be; they are vicious killers, and will kill more than they need to eat. I've seen this with my own eyes; 5 of our chickens slaughtered, only one of which was carried away to be eaten. People with small livestock consider them vermin, although no one wants to see them wiped out, as they're an intergral part of the natural order of things.

Here's what I can't understand: why would a person who believes in "animal rights" (a stupid idea, IMHO, as rights require responsibility..."freedom from unecessary suffering" is a more realistic ideal)...anyway, why would such a person choose foxes as the first target of opportunity? Because one thing is irrefuatable: your average fox enjoys a MUCH better life than any battery hen, veal calf, or intensively-raised pig. Why not tackle the real injustice first??

The next logical target would be abandoned & mistreated pets.

The truth behind this whole thing comes down to class hatred and a pathetic desire to force one group's (questionable) moral code on another group.

I used to be involved in "animal rights" actively a few yrs ago.
Trust me "animal rights" activists are just as active in trying to liberate all animals who are exploited and misused (Vivisection labs/Battery farms/Furriers etc..)
The Fox hunting issue just happens to be more news worthy and atracted the interest of the general public.
NO Human will be free until ALL animals are. Animal Liberation Now!

www.animalliberationfront.com...

Originally posted by ANOK
I used to be involved in "animal rights" actively a few yrs ago.
Trust me "animal rights" activists are just as active in trying to liberate all animals who are exploited and misused (Vivisection labs/Battery farms/Furriers etc..)
The Fox hunting issue just happens to be more news worthy and atracted the interest of the general public.
NO Human will be free until ALL animals are. Animal Liberation Now!

www.animalliberationfront.com...

That "NO human will be free" line is purely an opinion, with nothing to back it up. The whole concept of "freedom" is undefined; you need to specify 'free to do what? I believe all animals should be "free" from unecessary suffering at the hands of humans...there's nothing we can do about the suffering that animals inflict on each other.

I've never harmed an animal directly, although I have eaten many; what I do now is make sure that I only eat animals that were raised in a humane manner. Vegetarianism is of course an option, but if everyone went veggie, then millions of animals would never be born at all. Who are we to decide that a particular pig, for example, would rather not be born than to live for awhile under humane conditions? We should ban all intensive livestock business; the price of meat would go up, of course, so people would eat less of it (no bad thing), and what they do eat would be healthier and could be eaten with a clear conscience.

As for the fox hunting issue, you failed to respond to the key points, which seems typical of the whole debate from the animal-terrorist side.