This is not just crime. This is blatant crime. Welcome to Britain’s biggest, longest-lasting crimewave. Here’s what you need to know about the nation’s ongoing fox hunt scandal.
Fox hunts have continued to plague rural Britain despite the Labour Party-led Hunting Act 2004 making it illegal to hunt wild mammals with packs of dogs. The legislation quickly proved unfit for purpose thanks to glaring loopholes eagerly adopted by hunters, enabling the most shocking Establishment-led lie of the past two decades: the nonsense that is ‘trail hunting’ – a lie that has been revealed and proved beyond doubt in the Mark Hankinson case via one of the highest courts in the land.
At the same time the Crown Prosecution Service defines organised crime as ‘planned and co-ordinated criminal behaviour and conduct by people working together on a continuing basis’, which clearly describes fox hunts and other criminal hunts.
Too many UK police forces are complicit in hunt crime
The UK’s police forces are mired in hunt corruption. Plenty of officers ride with fox hunts. Some police forces actively protect hunts, turning up in person to support organised criminals as they commit flagrant wildlife crime. While hunt crime policing in some counties is finally changing for the better, in others things are getting worse. Having a hunt friendly copper on a force is no different from employing a copper who’s a member of a gang of burglars, shoplifters, or car thieves. It shouldn’t be possible.
How Tory politicians support fox hunt crime
Some Tory politicians are openly complicit in hunt crime. Geoffrey Cox, Tory MP for Torridge and West Devon, welcomes the organised criminal members of the Lamerton Hunt onto his land and Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg in Somerset hosted the appalling Mendip Farmers Hunt on his land as recently as March 2023. This means both prominent Tory MPs are in cahoots with organised criminals. They and their ilk should all be removed from the government immediately, not allowed to serve the public until they promise to act on the side of the law and protect our precious wildlife.
The royals are involved in fox hunting
Proving that the wealthy and aristocratic believe they’re above the law, hunts meet at stately homes, at country houses, on privately-owned land and more. Hunters have infiltrated the Pony Club, which feeds fresh young hunt criminals directly into fox hunting. Your local fox hunt is probably a ‘branch’ of the Pony Club. And shockingly, right at the top of the Establishment tree, members of the royal family still hunt, which means our royals are involved in organised crime.
Hunt crime support infests councils
The rot has made its way into parish councils, town councils, district councils and county councils, with hunt-supporting public servants in power across the board. They’ve been infiltrated, a scandal in itself since these people are supposed to be our servants. It is not their job to facilitate wildlife crime, but that’s what they do.
The fox hunt scandal extends far beyond hunt crime
In a wider context hunters themselves and hunt-supporting and hunt-following thugs do whatever they can to ensure local people are left feeling helpless. Hunters and their pet goons bully and threaten those who object to their crimes. Sometimes it’s so bad that people are driven from their homes, forced to move somewhere safer. In fact the crimes and torts committed by hunters and their hangers-on extend far beyond contravening the Hunting Act itself: road traffic crime, trespass, criminal damage to vehicles, grievous bodily harm to the public, cruel hound abuse, ignoring the rules around official permissions to gather on and block roads – and more.
Ordinary people fight back
Hundreds of ordinary people of every age, from every background, have been waging a war against these organised criminals since hunting became illegal. The Hunt Saboteurs Association has been battling hunt crime since 1963. Their members are still sabotaging hunts, and the organisation has recently been praised by Devon and Cornwall police’s Matt Longman for the crucial volunteer work they do. In fact the sabs and monitors are doing the police’s job for them, and it’s high time that was fixed as well.
This unprecedented crimewave has been going on for almost two decades, supported by public servants and their masters in the highest echelons of society. And all this, just to carry on the barbaric practice of killing foxes? Is it because foxes exemplify the battle between the Establishment and the changing world they hate and fear so much?
Whatever the reason, it’s a battle ordinary people like us will not stop fighting until hunt crime and the criminals who carry it out are dealt with, and the illegal mass slaughter of our fellow sentient beings finally ends.
PS. Thank you to @gaias_eye for the beautiful fox image.
