AROUND 7,000 pro hunt supporters – including many from Dawlish – gathered at Honiton Showground on Saturday to declare that the introduction of a hunting bill would not stop them pursuing the field sport.
Part of a nationwide campaign, 37,000 people were at simultaneous mass gatherings across England and Wales on the day.
People from the hunting, shooting and fishing communities, and many others who support the freedom to hunt, signed the Hunting Declaration – an independent initiative that commits them to refusing to cooperate with any hunting ban, and submitting themselves to the legal consequences.
Peter Boyne, a supporter from Dawlish, travelled up to the meet with a group of about 25 people.
'There were so many people there that they ran out of declaration forms and had to get some more. The car parks were so full, the attendants were having to turn people away,' he said.
'There were some great speeches from the speakers, who were all talking from the heart.
'It was worthwhile event, and it was good to see like-minded people coming together to save something that, in all of our opinions, is critical.'
Foxhounds, lurchers, greyhounds, beagles, mink hounds, terriers and horses were all present at every gathering around the country.
Chief executive of the Countryside Alliance, Simon Hart, said: 'On Saturday, 37,000 people who would never normally consider breaking the law, and who desperately do not want to have to disobey a potential hunting ban, have made a serious and solemn commitment. It is time for those politicians whose prejudiced and unfounded attack on hunting have led us to this point to question whether they can continue to justify their obsessive pursuit of a ban?
'Civil disobedience is a very serious step, and breaking the law is wrong, but in the case of patently unjust legislation which ignores evidence and principle, we believe that someone who has examined their conscience, and is satisfied that what they are doing is not inherently wrong, has a social right to draw attention to injustice by openly breaking the law. Provided that they meet their obligations to society by submitting themselves to trial and punishment.
'We hope that the government chooses a more sensible route and that those who signed the Hunting Declaration will never have to deliver on their commitment.'
Hunt supporters are claiming that 59 per cent of the public want to keep hunting, but the government is being urged by a strong backbench lobby of MPs to reintroduce the Hunting Bill at the start of the next session of Parliament.