This afternoon Jim Barrington visited the Royal Agricultural College and made the Case for Hunting and I was asked to photograph the talk by The Countryside Alliance. 

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Jim Barrington is the Countryside Alliance's animal welfare consultant.  Jim, was a Director of the League Against Cruel Sports until  1995, and has in the past said 'Like a lot of people I was quite horrified by hunting and took the view that stopping it would improve animal welfare. But the Hunting Act has failed on every level, not least of all on animal welfare."  

Jim continued: "But animal welfare means you have to confront things that aren't pleasant. In many ways the use of dogs is beneficial."

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We were joined by a number of well known figures from the local hunting community including Captain Ian Farquhar, from the Duke of Beaufort and renouned Foxhound Breeder Mr Martin Scott. Jim's talk was extremely interesting and some of the points discussed made a lot of sense.

What was apparent was that although the LACS and other organisations are against Hunting with Hounds on "welfare" grounds, when asked which other method of control they'd rather use ie snaring, shooting the question is very often ducked and left unanswered.

Jim's current blog looks at "Foxing the Badger Debate" which does raise some interesting points http://jamesbarrington.wordpress.com/

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