BRITAIN: Supporters of hunting with dogs in England and Wales vowed yesterday to exploit loopholes in the ban on hunting, which comes into force tomorrow, after losing a challenge to the ban in the Court of Appeal in London.
Three senior judges headed by the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Woolf, rejected the argument that the 1949 Parliament Act, which MPs used to force through the Hunting Act, was invalid.
The Hunting Act outlaws foxhunting, deer-hunting and hare coursing with dogs.
Lord Woolf described the challenge to the act by three hunt supporters funded by the Countryside Alliance as "unusual, and in modern times probably unprecedented".
He added: "In this respect, this case is no ordinary public law case and the judgment deals with an issue of considerable constitutional importance." The provisions of the Hunting Act were "highly controversial and bitterly opposed by substantial sections of the public. However, this case is not concerned with the wisdom or otherwise of the act."
Sir Sydney Kentridge, for the hunt supporters, argued that the Hunting Act was invalid because it was passed under the Parliament Act 1949, which, he argued, was not itself a valid act.
The Appeal Court, however, ruled that MPs had the power to pass the 1949 Parliament Act, and dismissed the alliance's appeal against a High Court ruling last month upholding the act's validity.
Lord Woolf said: "The restrictions on the exercise of the powers of the House of Lords that the 1949 act purported to make have been so widely recognised and relied upon that they are today a political fact."
The judges refused the alliance permission to appeal to the House of Lords, but Sir Sydney said an urgent application for permission would be made direct to the Law Lords.
In the meantime, the attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, did not object to an injunction staying any prosecutions for defying the ban, the court was told.
With feelings running high in the English countryside as the ban approaches, a stay would have been convenient for the government by postponing the furore until after the general election. But the judges refused it.
Lord Woolf said of the attorney general: "We don't think it is right he should seek to hide behind the courts in this matter."
Thousands of people are planning to arrange hunts across England and Wales this weekend. Mr Tim Bonner, spokesman for the Countryside Alliance, said: "To everyone looking at what is happening on the 19th it will look, sound and smell just like hunting did before. There will be people on horses and hundreds of farmers, hounds - and foxes will be killed."
Mr Darren Hughes of the alliance said some hunts would be hunting artificial fox scent, while others would go out with two dogs, flush foxes out and then shoot them, which was legal under the act.
The alliance is backing a second challenge to the ban on the basis of human rights laws.