Hunting row moves to the High Court

Tuesday, 25 January 2005 12:00 AM

Representatives of the Countryside Alliance are in the High Court today to legally challenge the ban on hunting.

Lawyers will attempt to argue that the 1949 Parliament Act, which was used to push the hunt ban through the House of Lords, is invalid and as a consequence so is any legislation passed with it.

Government lawyers will be defending the legality of the Parliament Act and counsel for the League Against Cruel Sports will be contesting any application for an injunction to delay the implementation of the hunting ban until the legal process has been exhausted.

It argues that the ban must commence as originally scheduled in February.

The Government has previously indicated that it would not impose any application for an injunction to delay the implementation of the ban. If the alliance loses the case, but is granted the right to appeal, it has said it would seek such a delay.

The High Court hearing is expected to last until Wednesday, with a judgement expected at the end of the week.

Countryside Alliance chairman, John Jackson, said the case had great constitutional significance.

He said: "Our request is based on the belief that the House of Commons exceeded its powers unlawfully by amending the Parliament Act of 1911 to create the 1949 Act. The Attorney General disagrees with us. If he is right, it will mean that we live in a country in which, without the consent of the House of Lords and with the Sovereign powerless to intervene, the House of Commons can change the structure and working of our constitution in any way it pleases. The ordinary citizen would have no possibility of redress. We believe that this cannot, and should not, be so."

The alliance is also intent on pursuing the case under European human rights legislation.

But the League Against Cruel Sports said it would be an affront to parliamentary democracy if the ban against hunting was delayed.

Barrister and chairman of the LACS, John Cooper, said: "The League Against Cruel Sports, acting on behalf of its members and supporters, and in defence of Parliamentary democracy, is opposing any delay to the commencement of the Hunting Act beyond February 18th - the date agreed by Parliament. We are fully confident that the hunters' challenge to the Parliament Act will fail.

"We are also convinced that the Countryside Alliance's claims that the Hunting Act breaches the European Convention of Human Rights will be soundly defeated. Now that the Hunting Act is on the statute books, we will not give in to the hunters' threats of civil disobedience, their intimidation of MPs, and the fact that they ride roughshod over ordinary people in the countryside, in order to continue their vile cruelty."

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