Improving the Hunting Act: recommendations

The Hunting Act must be so robust and clear-cut that any police officer knows that searching for, pursuing, and killing a wild mammal on any land no matter who owns it, is illegal. Our recommendations below go some way in addressing that.

Please note that some of these recommendations are contradictory. For example, one asks for no packs of hounds to be permitted, while in others we start from the assumption that they will be. It is for the lawmaker to decide which suggestions are needed to create the clear and robust legal framework to stop hunting once and for all.

1. Hunting any kind of a scent, including artificial, cannot be used as a defence for accidental, negligent or reckless chases or kills. While trail hunting must be banned, it cannot be used as a defence to argue that there was no intention. In addition, hunts should not be able to argue other legal activities as a defence – that they were simply walking their hounds, for instance.
2. Hunts must be able to produce proof that they have trained all their hounds not to pursue wild mammals. Guidance accompanying the amended Hunting Act or any new legislation must give details of the methods that the hunts should use.
3. If a hunt dog, in the control of a person, whether that person is present or not, kills a wild mammal, this should be an offence. There should be no need to prove an intention to hunt.
4. In the event trail hunting is allowed to continue, hunts should keep full records of trail laying, for example: who laid the trail, what the trail was, when it took place and, where. This must be produced when requested by officials. In addition, the planned route of the hunt and the hounds being taken out must be provided in advance and a copy carried during hunt outings and made available on request by officials.
5. Hunt staff must know the route of the trails. To stop the hounds, the huntsman and whipper-in need to know the route of the hunt – if they don’t know the route, they cannot possibly know if the hounds have deviated from it. The hunt must carry a copy of the map during the hunt, and have it available for anyone to see. They should be required to log the map in advance of the hunt. In some cases, defendants have produced a trail map in court long after the incident happened, and this has been accepted as a defence without any proof of when it was created.
6. It should be mandatory that hounds are called off any chase immediately. New guidance must include a section describing the methods the huntsman must use to call off their hounds if they encounter a wild mammal. For example, to stop the hounds effectively, they need to be able to get in front of them. Allowing a distance to build up between them and the hounds means they are unlikely to be able to prevent an accident. The guidance could explain that hounds must be kept as close as possible to the hunt members with a permitted distance.
7. There needs to be clear instruction as to what constitutes proper control of hounds. New guidance should outline the strategies the huntsman and the whipper-in must use during a hunt to prevent them from pursuing and killing wildlife.
8. Hunts must not be allowed to take their hounds into places where wildlife lives and rests – woods, for instance. There must be a buffer zone around any land where wild mammals are likely to live and rest. Hunts must not take their hounds inside this zone. The type of land used by resting wildlife must be specified in the law or guidance.
9. The new law must make it an offence to disturb a fox in its resting place. To hunt foxes, the hunt has to find the fox first and they do this usually by rousing a fox from its rest in a covert.
10. The new law must give a very clear and inclusive definition of what hunting is. This should include (but not be limited to) employing dogs to:
11. Search for a mammal or
12. Pursue a mammal or
13. Kill a mammal

This means that conducting any one of the above activities counts as ‘hunting’.

11. Allowing hounds to enter any private property without permission of the landowner should be illegal. It should not simply be a trespass matter.
12. All pursuits should be illegal, no matter how long they are. The Hunting Act does not specify how long a chase needs to be for it to be considered illegal. For example, in the Schedule 1, (1) (7) exemption of flushing out an animal to be shot, the law only specifies that the wild mammal must be shot dead “as soon as possible after being found”. This leaves the exemption open to interpretation. The new law must specify that no chase of any length by any number of dogs should be allowed. This will also provide much needed clarity in the evidence-gathering process, as even a few seconds of chasing would demonstrate an unlawful act.
13. The new law should not facilitate any kind of hunting through exemptions. There is growing evidence that the hunts abuse the current exemptions. For example, the exemption that permits ‘flushing to guns’ has allowed hunts to create a smokescreen by having terrier-men accompanying hunts in order to dig out foxes that have taken refuge underground. The intention is not to shoot them immediately, but rather release them to be chased. A complete explanation of how this exemption is abused can be found here.

The exemption for falconry is also abused by hunts who simply take a bird of prey with them in order to disingenuously claim this exemption.

Stag hunts in particular use exemptions to pursue and kill stags several times a week in season. ‘Research and Observation’ and ‘Rescue of a Wild Mammal’ are frequently abused. For example, stag hunters have verbally claimed that they are pursuing a sick deer, despite chasing them for some hours at speed over difficult terrain. Stag hunts have also claimed that they are hunting stags with bTB. Badgworthy Land Company have produced a report on this subject. Note: this company is owned by the Devon and Somerset Staghounds.

14. The new law should prohibit all use of dogs for hunting, as opposed to the current law of allowing up to two.
15. The Hunting Act should make it illegal for a person to pursue or frighten wild mammals while accompanying a hunt. A large number of followers on foot and in vehicles accompany stag hunts. Stag hunts usually use only two hounds, and the followers often step in to stop the hunted stag from escaping. They shout, wave their arms and use any means to frighten the animal. This also happens during cub hunting, when hunters on horseback surround a wood, and shout and slap their saddles to stop cubs from escaping. The banned activities involved in this kind of hunting should be specified.
16. The new law should include an offence of ‘Going Equipped’ to hunt. Guidance could explain that this would include objects used to dig out foxes. A similar offence exists in the Theft Act 1968 for going equipped for stealing.
17. Out of control hounds are the responsibility of the Master and any hunt staff, whether they are nearby or not.
18. Complete guidance should accompany the law to ensure that all enforcement agents understand the signs of hunting. This should include a full explanation of horn calls, voice calls, field positions, details about hound training and hound behaviour, and tactics for traditional hunting (for example how to find a fox to hunt).
19. Penalties need to be more impactful. Currently the fines are insignificant and unlikely to deter anyone from illegal hunting.
20. Hunting Act cases must no longer be summary only. In summary offences, there is a six-month time limit to bring a charge. In some cases, police have had difficulty in contacting the perpetrators. The time limit also puts police under too much pressure to complete a complex case.
21. Hunt masters, and the Hunt as an organisation, should be held responsible for illegal actions of any hunt staff. Hunts should also be held corporately responsible.
22. Hunts should be banned from taking hounds into residential areas and onto A & B roads.
23. There should be penalties for withholding information. In many cases, identifying the perpetrator has been a problem, even though it seems highly unlikely that hunt members cannot identify other members of their own hunt.
24. If a person, or a hunt as a corporate body, has a conviction for illegal hunting, that person, or body, must be banned from hunting for life.

THESE SUGGESTIONS COME FROM OUR REPORT “BROKEN LAW”.