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Hunt
supporters ride on parliament in spirit of ‘49
HUNTING
HORNS and car hooters blared as 80 riders in tweeds and hunting
pink rode through London last week in a re-enactment of the
1949 farmers’ protest against moves to end their sport.
Traffic was halted as the demonstrators made their way from
Hyde Park Corner to Parliament, where one of the three surviving
members of the original protest handed over a letter urging
the Government to abandon plans for a hunting ban.
Bemused tourists and office workers looked on as the riders,
incongruous in their urban setting, trotted past the Ritz and
wove around Eros. A woman saddler was injured in a collision
with an RSPCA van as hundreds of protesters joined in on foot.
Dan Barton, 73, a member of the Piccadilly Hunt - as the 1949
ride became known - said it compared favourably with the original
march. “But it was very different then,” he added.
“The Government understood farmers and the countryside
more than they do today and it did have an impact - the anti-hunting
bill was voted out.
“We have been the most law-abiding organisation in the
country but if push comes to shove, I don’t know what will
happen.”
In 1949, twenty riders hired horses from stables near Hyde Park
before riding to Westminster. Last week, however, Mr Barton
caught the Tube to Parliament. He gave up hunting four years
ago after more than 60 years.
Problems
He
handed over the letter pledging to continue the fight for
field sports to pro-hunting Conservative MPs James Gray, Hugo
Swire and Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, who promised to take it
directly to Tony Blair.
Kate Hoey, the pro-hunting Labour MP joined the marchers in
Parliament Square. She said she hoped Mr Blair would focus
attention on the “huge number of problems facing this
country” rather than on “banning people’s livelihoods
in the so-called name of animal welfare when all of us against
the ban know it’s in the interests of the fox”.
An RSPCA inspector in a van had been detailed to follow the
protestors to “monitor the horses’ welfare”,
but ended up compromising the welfare of a woman protestor
by driving over her foot. After much thumping on the van roof,
the inspector reversed off the woman’s foot.
Witnesses were angry that the RSPCA Inspector remained in
his van while the woman lay waiting for an ambulance. However,
an RSPCA spokesman later claimed that the inspector had been
told to stay in his van by the police officer accompanying
him. A police spokesman said that no formal complaint had
been lodged and refused to discuss details further.
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