Anti-hunt plan a recipe for conflict in the countryside, according to this is Devon. What do you think?
Its nothing new, they have always engaged in these kind of activity's. I actually suspect this is only a publicity stunt as the LCS has been selling off land at an alarming rate due to cash flow problems.
What many will feel uncomfortable about, however, is the announcement yesterday that the League is investing £1 million in its investigations and operations department to increase the covert monitoring and investigation of hunts in order to gather evidence that it hopes will result in prosecutions. There is no room, in the countryside or anywhere else, for vigilantes taking on the role of police officers and turning detective in an attempt to get huntsmen and women arrested and charged. It is a recipe for conflict and we suspect the police will privately be extremely concerned.
Of course it is the responsibility of all members of the public to report criminal activity to the police and help, where they can, provide information that might lead to a conviction. Anti-hunt campaigners, however, have always taken a more pro-active stance, through disrupting legal hunts, both before and since the ban, and using monitors to film and record hunt activity in the hope of identifying illegal behaviour. To date they have been unsuccessful here in the Westcountry with not a single registered hunt convicted since the introduction of the ban.
