What happened in this campaign?

Last year (2022), nine packs of hounds displayed at the Gillingham and Shaftesbury Show. ALL of the packs – barring one – are involved in chasing and killing wild mammals. This year, our campaign urged the Gillingham and Shaftesbury Show to take a compassionate stance and stop inviting hunts to display their hounds at the show.

Three anti bloodsports’ organisations and an independent researcher (Bernard Sullivan) were involved in the campaign. The League Against Cruel Sports, Protect the Wild and AAF. This is not the first time that AAF has tangled with the show, and exposed their underhand and unethical dealings: https://www.actionagainstfoxhunting.org/gillingham-and-shaftesbury-show-2021/

A couple of months before the 2023 show, the League Against Cruel Sports wrote to the organisers asking them not to allow any hunts to display their hounds. The organisers did not reply. A few weeks before the show, the League asked their supporters to email the show with the same request. Again, no replies.

Mr Sullivan, who had been contacting the organisers for some years, was verbally told that no hunt with pending prosecutions would be invited. However, when he asked which hunts would be attending, they did not give a straight answer, claiming that the person organising the hound displays was on holiday. In fact, the show did all it could to avoid answering, even when Mr Sullivan visited the organisers’ tent a day before the show.

Protect the Wild also became involved. They began an email campaign of their own – asking the organisers what they had to hide. The public sent over 4000 emails, none of which received an answer.
AAF volunteers leafleted both Gillingham and Shaftesbury with “Do You Really Know What You’re Supporting” flyers – hoping to put off some residents from visiting the show.

On August 12^th – unexpectedly – a post appeared on the Gillingham and Shaftesbury Show’s Facebook page praising the humane activities of the South Downs Bloodhounds – a clean boot hunt which does not hurt wild animals. This hunt WAS invited to the show, they said, and “instead of tracking the scent of foxes”… “no foxes are hunted or harmed in this sport”. They completely forgot to mention that fox hunting is illegal – and appeared to be saying that hunting foxes is exactly what the other hunts do all the time. For once, they were telling the truth. HOWEVER, the ONLY REASON why the South Downs Bloodhounds were there at all was because Mr Sullivan had suggested inviting them in 2022 and they had accepted.
The anti-bloodsports community took heart from this and hoped that the show had finally understood how unethical and unpopular fox hunting is.
It was on this post that the show (replying to a comment from Mr Sullivan) said that hunts with “pending prosecutions” had been un-invited.
The show began on 16^th August. Members of AAF were there, waiting to see which hunts were displaying the hounds.

The first pack to arrive was the South and West Wilts. This hunt is rarely sabbed, meaning that there is no one to watch them hunting and killing foxes. They brought their hounds into the ring, and caused chaos from the moment they arrived. Their hound control was truly awful.

Then the Blackmore and Sparkford Vale Hunt arrived. Members of this hunt are due in court for assault.

Shortly afterwards, the Portman Hunt entered the ring. Members of this hunt are in court in November for illegal hunting. The School of Infantry Beagles, and Wiltshire Beagles also attended.

The compere treated us all to a description of “trail hunting” – in a weak attempt to fool the audience into believing that “trail hunting” is actually a real thing.
After all the hunts had arrived – after some of the hounds and broken free and run out of the ring – after several of the hounds had defecated and urinated on the grass, the compere decided it was time to let children into the ring to pet the hounds. He had mentioned earlier, that hunts collect “flesh” for farmers. This is “fallen stock” – farm animals who have died in the fields of any cause, diseased animals maybe. No one finds out what these animals have died of. The hunts feed the flesh raw to the hounds. The hounds (now petted by children) could have been eating infected RAW meat only hours earlier. The children were up close, touching the hounds – with NO BIOSECURITY whatsoever – no hand-washing facilities – not even any hand sanitiser.

When the show was over, three members of AAF went to the organisers’ tent to ask (politely) why the Portman and the Blackmore and Sparkford Vale Hunt were at the show when they had “pending prosecutions”. We spoke to Nick Hill, the chief organiser. He said this:

• He did not want to be filmed or recorded.
• He had asked the Portman if they were being prosecuted and they said they weren’t.
• They would be having a debrief about what had happened, and would be discussing it.
• He said they’d had lots of emails and some abusive phone calls.
• He said he knew nothing about the BSV prosecutions.
• He agreed that the foxhounds were out of control.
• He agreed that next year, the show would include AAF in the discussions.
• He was relieved that we weren’t shouting at him.
• He said he would email AAF soon.

Of course, he has not emailed.

The Facebook comment (pictured above) stating that “any hunt with a pending prosecution had been un-invited was deleted.

After the show, AAF issued this Press Release

Protect the Wild published a blog: https://protectthewild.org.uk/news/gillingham-and-shaftesbury-show-whos-not-telling-the-truth/

Video of the hound display can be found here:

https://youtu.be/AukqEV7hRcU

Next Steps

In the unlikely event of Mr Hill contacting Pip Donovan to involve AAF in the debrief, we will be making it very clear that we (the anti-bloodsports community) should be allowed a voice and deserve a response. They cannot continue to ignore us. We will not simply go away. The show made a “BIG THING” about the presence of the South Downs Bloodhounds and how ethical they are. Their comments showed without any shadow of a doubt that they know exactly what the other hunts are doing to our wildlife. The trail hunting smokescreen has long since dispersed. The organisers’ lies to us – public, recorded lies (since deleted – a pretty clear admission of guilt) showed crawling cowardice. They wanted to get over the moment, and nothing more.

This does not end here. More and more hunts are finding themselves in court, more and more hunt are folding and more and more people are finding out what deceitful, animal abusing bullies they are. As the young girl sitting beside me on the bench at the show said “We don’t like them” (indicating the BSV), ” but we do like them – a lot!” She was pointing to the South Downs Bloodhounds, of course.

The Gillingham and Shaftesbury Show is a fine event (if you close your eyes to the animal abuse) and some exciting things go on in that ring. How the hunts can compare with the other “acts” – people parachuting into the ring, the young bikers who zoomed up ramps higher than my house and twisting and turning in the air, is a mystery. How they can bypass risk assessments and allow children to interact with hounds who have just polished off a dead cow’s raw pathogen-filled leg is a bigger mystery. We have work to do, and we know exactly how to do it.

Pip Donovan 31st August 2023.