Martin pledges to keep hunting ban

The campaign group Keep The Ban (http://www.keeptheban.org.uk/) are asking all parliamentary candidates to commit to keeping the hunting ban if they are elected on 8 June. Cheltenham’s Liberal Democrat candidate Martin Horwood has been quick to sign the pledge.
 Fox

The Conservatives have again said they will bring forward a vote on repealing the hunting ban, on which MPs are traditionally allowed a free vote.

Cheltenham’s Liberal Democrat candidate and former MP, Martin Horwood, has been quick to sign the pledge and put this video on social media this morning: https://twitter.com/ClareSoftley/status/864423997542457344. 

Martin said: “We were warned that the hunting ban would wreck the rural economy, stop even the valuable social side of hunts and make it impossible to protect livestock.  None of that turned out to be true and I don’t think Parliament should go back to condoning the hunting of animals for fun.”

Martin took up many animal welfare causes as an MP, many in conjunction with Cheltenham based charity Naturewatch (naturewatch.org).  He successfully campaigned for more money for alternatives to animal research, voted for the ban on wild animals in circuses, supported the international whaling ban and opposed the badger cull in Gloucestershire and elsewhere.  In 2009 he was voted Animal Welfare Champion by fellow parliamentarians of all parties at the Dods political awards.

Martin added: “At the Trinity church hustings in 2015, all the parliamentary candidates were asked to say yes or no to keeping the hunting ban. Alex Chalk famously replied ‘free vote’.  Well, we all know it’s a free vote but that was just dodging the question!  We then found out he was being actively supported by members of the Vale of White Horse Hunt, North Cotswold Hunt and the pro-hunting organisation Vote OK – so it’s pretty clear where he stands on this issue.  The question is: will he have the courage to say so this time?”  (He didn’t.  Despite again receiving active support from hunt members, Alex Chalk replied ‘pass’ to the same question at the same hustings in 2017!)

Author: Martin Horwood

Lib Dem councillor for Leckhampton, ex-MP for Cheltenham and ex-MEP for South West England & Gibraltar

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