Pro-hunting campaigners lost their latest legal bid to overturn the ban on hunting with dogs in England and Wales on Friday.
They had asked the Court of Appeal to rule that the ban infringed European Union trading and employment regulations and breached the European Convention on Human Rights.
But three appeal judges upheld an earlier high court ruling that the ban was lawful. They said imposing it was a ”legitimate and proportionate” exercise of government powers.
The Countryside Alliance, which campaigns on rural issues and leads the fight to restore hunting with dogs, called the law ”a divisive sectarian measure”, which could ruin the livelihoods of thousands of people who earn their living from hunting.
The Hunting Act 2004 outlaws fox hunting, deer hunting and hare coursing with dogs. It came into force in February 2005.
The judges described the row over the ban as having been ”prominent and highly controversial in English public life for many years”.
Brian Friend, secretary of the Liberal Democrat Forum for the Countryside, said he was disappointed, adding that the judge’s decision was not unexpected.
”It does seem that human rights are applied to some people in this country and not to others,” he said after the ruling.
He pledged to take the case forward to the European courts, saying he would ”never give in”.
Hounds are still allowed to follow a scent and flush out foxes and other quarry, which can then be killed by a bird of prey or shot if only two dogs are involved. — AFP
