UK News 18-02-2005 The Last Hunt who: Countryside Alliance what: Threatens to test hunting ban when: This weekend snippet: The ban on blood sports has come into effect but, says The Times, the law is "in chaos" because, with the Countryside Alliance promising to put the legisltaion to the test this weekend, "police and prosecution lawyers have received no guidance on enforcing the ban". "Anyone caught chasing and killing a fox, deer, mink or hare with hounds now faces a £5,000 fine," says The Times. But of course, hunting is not banned per se. "Under the legislation it is permitted for riders to follow dogs as they exercise or as they chase a `trail hunt`," explains The Scotsman, "following a scent, laid down beforehand by dragging a dead fox across fields and farmland. They are also permitted to flush a fox to guns. Under the law they are permitted to hunt rabbits, but not hares, and rats, but not mice." One thing seems certain - the ban will not settle the argument over hunting. In the papers, the pro-hunting campaign is maintained most vociferously by The Telegraph. In Thursday`s paper, Charles Moore attacks the "antis" for the foolhardy belief that an end to fox hunting will be an end to cruelty. "When caught by hounds, [the quarry] dies within seconds," he says. "Because of the ban, more foxes will be wounded by shooting and snaring." Disappointingly, most of the other papers are not interested in picking up the gauntlet. Public opinion it seems, is not bitterly divided. "A MORI/BBC poll this week shows that support for the ban has fallen significantly," says The Guardian, "while opposition to it has grown only slightly". Only The Mirror says "good riddance" to fox hunting and adds it to a list that includes cock fighting and bear baiting as pastimes "we`re glad to see the back of". "We`re angry and upset," Graeme Worsley, of the Old Surrey Burstow and West Kent Hunt, is reported to have told The Mirror`s Gary Jones. One can almost imagine the blood driopping from his chops as he continues: "I had a knot in my throat, but it`s not the end. We killed four foxes today, a lot of fun." Yet the South Durham Hunt proved just how little blood there sometimes is in blood sport when they spent a large part of Thursday "in pursuit of a fox that has made its den in a field beside Tony Blair`s constituency home in Trimdon," says The Independent. "Dubbed `Tony`s Fox` by the hunt, which has been pursuing it for five years, the quarry once again escaped, going to ground in an allotment yards from the Prime Minister`s home." [... more]

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