Tag: league against cruel sports

Interview | Nick Weston, League Against Cruel Sports

Posted on July 21, 2021August 4, 2021 by Charlie Moores

“..to do anything other than get rid of the licences would be bad for animals…which is ultimately why we’re doing this, it’s for the animals…” Nick Weston is the Head of Campaigns at the League Against Cruel Sports. Like everyone else at the League (and at other animal welfare/animal rights organisations) he is passionate about animals. It seems an obvious statement to make, but sometimes even seasoned campaigners get so involved in the latest struggle that we forget to make it clear why we fight, why we protest and campaign. Without wanting to put words in anyone else’s mouth, it’s because we love animals. As Chris Packham has so astutely said, we are fuelled by a sense of injustice. We detest the bullies who hurt them and loathe the organisations that work to find ways to marginalise or demonise them because we are compelled by a need to help and protect. In the following interview Charlie Moores talks with Nick about the National Trust’s position on so-called ‘trail hunting’ and the work being done by campaigners to ensure that by the next AGM (this autumn) as many members of the Trust as possible know that their charity facilitates hunting on its land and that through its licences the Trust is not just risking damage to protected landscapes but allowing animals to be harmed as well.

Huge majority of Scots opposed to grouse shooting

Posted on November 3, 2020November 3, 2020 by Charlie Moores

New data gathered by League Against Cruel Sports Scotland as part of its work with the Revive Coalition for grouse moor reform show that seven in ten of those polled are opposed to grouse shooting for sport. The figures will come as an unwelcome wake-up call to the grouse shooting industry which has relied for years on its ‘normalisation’ of slaughtering grouse and a supportive media trotting out the mantra of tradition, ‘sport’ and the (in)glorious twelfth and the importance to the economy of a relatively few minimum wage jobs. That was never sustainable under targeted analysis that has uncovered the truth about wildlife crime, raptor persecution, widescale trapping of snaring of native predators, and the burning of the uplands solely to support the intensive farming of Red grouse for the gun.

Devon and Somerset Staghounds filmed cracking whip over a deer’s head

Posted on October 7, 2020December 5, 2020 by Charlie Moores

Who is it that says on their website that, “There are now more than 2500 deer on the moor, which makes the south west herd of red deer much the largest in England and they are readily visible to deer watchers, tourists and local people who love their deer.”? And who has been filmed hitting a deer, cruelly prolonging a chase, and whose supporters were recorded pushing the same exhausted deer back towards the hunt? That would be the Devon and Somerset Staghounds…

LACS | The National Trust and Trail Hunting

Posted on June 13, 2020October 28, 2020 by Charlie Moores

We’ve written many times about the National Trust (NT, one of the UK’s most important conservation charities) and its unfortunate affair with so-called ‘trail hunting’ (see a National Trust and Trail Hunting 101 for example). We’d rather not have to keep repeating ourselves, but so-called ‘trail hunting’ is a clear example of the war on wildlife, we exist to help tackle that war, and there is no good reason whatsoever for the NT to facilitate ‘trail hunting’ on its land. It’s not just us that thinks this of course: no-one outside of hunting thinks one of the country’s most respected charities should be allowing fox hunts to break the law on charity-owned land.

Podcast: Checking in with Nick Weston, League Against Cruel Sports

Posted on March 26, 2020March 30, 2020 by Charlie Moores

Here at The War on Wildlife Project we were thinking that as us campaigners, conservationists, and activists can’t get out to meet and see each other now, how about creating something to bring the conservation community together – everyone from individuals to grassroots organisations to larger charities – something that reminds us all that we’re still out there, still working, but that also shows the human side of things during this COVID-19 crisis. We could think of them as ‘check-ins’ – as in ‘checking-in to make sure we’re all okay’.

Fox Hunts | How Many?!

Posted on February 19, 2020March 4, 2020 by Charlie Moores

It seems to have skipped the notice of many of the UK’s many fox/stag/hare hunters that in 2002 Scotland passed the Protection Of Wild Mammals Act and that England and Wales passed the Hunting Act 2004 (which came into force in early 2005). Perhaps there wasn’t enough publicity at the time – or every year since. In fact there are hundreds of hunts still operating, and now, writes Charlie Moores, the League Against Cruel Sports have devised an interactive map to show exaclty where they are.

Animal Welfare and the General Election 2019

Posted on November 22, 2019December 3, 2019 by Charlie Moores

There are just weeks left before the UK’s General Election, and most political pundits (and perhaps most voters) are focussing on financial commitments and Brexit. Where do the major political parties stand on animal welfare and issues like, for example, fox hunting though? Who, asks Charlie Moores, best represents the pro-wildlife voter?

Reading not Shooting

Posted on November 14, 2019November 14, 2019 by Charlie Moores

Some excellent news in the efforts to tackle the War On Wildlife – the University of Reading has “decided to end organised game shooting on its land”. Shooting has been taking place at Hall Farm, which is owned by the university and is around five miles from the main campus.

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