A toff-hunting we will go
Simon Hoggart
Wednesday October 13, 2004
The Guardian
Lord Whitty, who proposed the second reading of the hunting bill in the Lords, began with a long, loud sigh, rather like Mr Bennet hearing another of his daughters knock on his study door in search of cash for a new dress.
Everyone was familiar with the bill, he said - why, it was exactly the same as the one they had pondered last year.
Was there any real need to consider it all again? The Commons had voted seven times, by huge majorities, for a ban on hunting. Can't we all, his body language, indeed his actual vocabulary, seemed to say, pack it in and go home?
Fat chance. The Lords regard this bill as slightly less important than, say, female emancipation, but rather more important than the abolition of the slave trade. They believe they are not talking about a few dozen furry animals, but the eternal flame of human liberty.
As Baroness Mallalieu, a Labour peer and herself a huntsperson, put it: "The stench of this bill, if it ever becomes law, will pollute the record of this government."
What? More than the 45-minute claim, which only a few hours before Jack Straw had been obliged to disown in the Commons, laying it fastidiously to one side, as one might dispose of a smelly old fox fur discovered in the attic of a recently deceased aunt. More than that?
Baroness Byford, who kicked off for the Tories, warmed up on the pitch with a few observations about "this ancient parliament", always a sign that we're going to get some gorgeous, hand-stitched march of time-type tapestry. "They have abandoned the principle of concern for minorities; they are crushing civil liberties."
She asked who could doubt that horse racing would be banned next. Up to a point, I thought. Horse racing doesn't yet end up with the horse being torn to shreds by dogs. On the other hand, horses don't overturn your dustbins.
The Bishop of Chelmsford, if I understood him correctly, thought you couldn't go round banning things just because you didn't like them. You might as well ban adultery, gambling and tobacco.
Each to his own. But it sounds as if a weekend in the bishop's palace at Chelmsford might be fun.
Lord Mancroft was very cross indeed. He denounced Sir Gerald Kaufman for calling the hunt protesters "racist, larcenous scum", adding, "if that sort of language were used about any other minority - gay people, black people or, God forbid, Jewish people ..." He somehow forgot to mention that Sir Gerald was describing an event when hunt protesters had thrown anti-semitic abuse at him, while one of them tried to steal his wallet.
Lord Mancroft accused the government of "behaving like a fascist dictatorship". The hyperbole in that line seems to me to imply a certain anti-semitism, but no doubt unconscious.
David Steel made one of the more reasonable pro-hunting speeches, arguing that John Prescott had demonstrated that the bill wasn't really meant to abolish hunting, but to abolish toffs.
"A bill to abolish toffs might seem to have a rationale, unlike this bill," he said. Of course. Ministers have been trying and failing to abolish toffs for years.
One of the most thoughtful contributions came from Lord Burns, whose report on hunting declared that it "seriously compromised the welfare of the fox". As any fox will tell you.
Basically he told the peers that they had made a huge tactical error by not accepting a compromise earlier, and now they were going to pay with a complete ban on hunting. You could almost hear the chill run round the chamber.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
Simon Hoggart
Wednesday October 13, 2004
The Guardian
Lord Whitty, who proposed the second reading of the hunting bill in the Lords, began with a long, loud sigh, rather like Mr Bennet hearing another of his daughters knock on his study door in search of cash for a new dress.
Everyone was familiar with the bill, he said - why, it was exactly the same as the one they had pondered last year.
Was there any real need to consider it all again? The Commons had voted seven times, by huge majorities, for a ban on hunting. Can't we all, his body language, indeed his actual vocabulary, seemed to say, pack it in and go home?
Fat chance. The Lords regard this bill as slightly less important than, say, female emancipation, but rather more important than the abolition of the slave trade. They believe they are not talking about a few dozen furry animals, but the eternal flame of human liberty.
As Baroness Mallalieu, a Labour peer and herself a huntsperson, put it: "The stench of this bill, if it ever becomes law, will pollute the record of this government."
What? More than the 45-minute claim, which only a few hours before Jack Straw had been obliged to disown in the Commons, laying it fastidiously to one side, as one might dispose of a smelly old fox fur discovered in the attic of a recently deceased aunt. More than that?
Baroness Byford, who kicked off for the Tories, warmed up on the pitch with a few observations about "this ancient parliament", always a sign that we're going to get some gorgeous, hand-stitched march of time-type tapestry. "They have abandoned the principle of concern for minorities; they are crushing civil liberties."
She asked who could doubt that horse racing would be banned next. Up to a point, I thought. Horse racing doesn't yet end up with the horse being torn to shreds by dogs. On the other hand, horses don't overturn your dustbins.
The Bishop of Chelmsford, if I understood him correctly, thought you couldn't go round banning things just because you didn't like them. You might as well ban adultery, gambling and tobacco.
Each to his own. But it sounds as if a weekend in the bishop's palace at Chelmsford might be fun.
Lord Mancroft was very cross indeed. He denounced Sir Gerald Kaufman for calling the hunt protesters "racist, larcenous scum", adding, "if that sort of language were used about any other minority - gay people, black people or, God forbid, Jewish people ..." He somehow forgot to mention that Sir Gerald was describing an event when hunt protesters had thrown anti-semitic abuse at him, while one of them tried to steal his wallet.
Lord Mancroft accused the government of "behaving like a fascist dictatorship". The hyperbole in that line seems to me to imply a certain anti-semitism, but no doubt unconscious.
David Steel made one of the more reasonable pro-hunting speeches, arguing that John Prescott had demonstrated that the bill wasn't really meant to abolish hunting, but to abolish toffs.
"A bill to abolish toffs might seem to have a rationale, unlike this bill," he said. Of course. Ministers have been trying and failing to abolish toffs for years.
One of the most thoughtful contributions came from Lord Burns, whose report on hunting declared that it "seriously compromised the welfare of the fox". As any fox will tell you.
Basically he told the peers that they had made a huge tactical error by not accepting a compromise earlier, and now they were going to pay with a complete ban on hunting. You could almost hear the chill run round the chamber.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
