Plymouth MP Luke Pollard has called for fox hunting to be banned “fully” by closing loopholes associated with “trail hunting”.
Boxing Day is a traditional day for fox hunts to meet across the country including in Devon. Although hunting with dogs has been banned since 2005, trail hunting escapes the ban, and this practice continues to lead to foxes being killed.
Trail Hunting is where hunters chase a fox scent that was been placed in advance rather than a real fox. This is being used as cover to allow actual fox hunting to take place, as was revealed in a recent court case. [1]
Luke Pollard MP has used this opportunity to call for these rules to be tightened. He said:
“Fox hunting is a cruel practice that needs to be consigned to the history books. To do that we need to close the loopholes in the Hunting Act to stop trail hunting. Government could do more and that means banning fox hunts from meeting on public land owned by the Ministry of Defence and Defra.
“We need to tighten the rules to ban trail hunting, and end fox hunting for good.”