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The hunt war rages on - four years after Act introduced

15:54, 17 February 2009

Kent's hunt campaigners are still clashing - four years to the day after hunting with dogs was banned.

As the anti-hunt lobby prepares to release video footage allegedly showing aggression towards their monitors, both sides are still as fiercely loyal to their cause as ever.

Louise Robertson, senior press officer for the League Against Cruel Sports, said the lobby group was releasing a video today to show "some of the harassment and intimidation that League monitors are subjected to when they are going out and monitoring peacefully and within the law."

She said the "serious verbal abuse to physical abuse" was now happening on a very regular basis, albeit by a minority on hunt supporters.

Nick Onslow, hunt campaigner for the East Kent Foxhounds, said the group had seen the occasional monitor, sometimes dressed in combat gear and balaclavas, but not as many as other areas.

He said the Act had "done nothing for animal welfare."

He added: "It has threatened livelihoods in the longer term, it ignores all the evidence, it gives succour to animal rights extremists, it's based on political expedience: it's a nonsense."

He said his hunt had been forced to leave a fox-based trail for the hounds since the law banned killing of foxes.

But he predicted the law would soon be repealed.

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