NO HUNTS ON BOXING DAY

 NO EXCUSE FOR HUNTS - FROM PROTECT THE WILD

This Boxing Day a controversial event is set to take place in Battle, a town and civil parish in the district of Rother in East Sussex.

We and Action Against Foxhunting (who have an informative page about this issue here) would like your help to stop it.

The catchily named 'ESRM with South Down & Eridge Hunt' - an amalgamated hunt formed from the embers of the now folded East Sussex & Romney Marsh Hunt and the Southdown & Eridge Hunt and based in Ringmer, some twenty miles from Battle - will be holding a Boxing Day Meet (or Hunt Parade).

The Parade will take place on Abbey Green and along the High Street. The hunt is planning to bring around 30 dogs to the event which will be unleashed and allowed to run through the town.

Which they shouldn't be allowed to do.

And that's because in 2021 Rother District Council (RDC) imposed a Public Space Protection Order (PSPO) on Battle.

PSPOs were introduced under ‘Community Protection’ in the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 and they give local authorities (like Rother District Council) the power to “ban specific acts in a designated geographical area in England and Wales”.

The rules and guidelines on PSPOs are a touch complex (see our Protectors of the Wild Page here for more details) but while the specific details and the areas covered vary depending on the circumstances, they are legally binding. In this particular case, the PSPO in force in Battle legally requires dog owners to put their dogs on leads all year round in an area that includes - to quote the Council's own PSPO - 'the High Street, Market Square, Market Road and Market Road Car Park, Mount Street from the High Street to the entrance to the Car Park, Abbey Court and the Recreation Grounds at North Trade Road and at Telham', and for owners to remove any faeces the dog may leave behind.

The Order was issued for reasons of public health and safety and is valid until 11th January 2024.

One law for residents and one for hunts?That seems clear-cut doesn't it? And in fact, an FOI by a local resident revealed that Rother District Council takes its PSPO very seriously and has issued SIXTY-SIX Fixed Penalty Notices to individuals for contravention of the PSPO. Clearly, the council is prepared to fine any resident who brings a dog into the area without a lead.

Yet on 10th November 2023, the Council's Head of Environmental Health, Richard Parker-Harding, unilaterally decided in advance of the Parade that RDC will not be enforcing their Public Space Protection Order when it comes to the Parade.

Can they do that? While the law forbids them from rescinding the PSPO completely, they can decide not to enforce it if there is a 'reasonable excuse' to not do so.

And the reasonable excuse they gave:  "...no action will be taken because it would not be appropriate, the dogs are associated with the Hunt, which is a traditional publicised event, which occurs infrequently, for a short duration."

In other words, if a resident brings an unleashed dog into town they'll be fined, but if a hunt brings in thirty unleashed dogs they can run about the area, defecating where they please, and won't be fined because hunting foxes is 'traditional' and they'll only be in town for an hour or two before heading off into the countryside to kill something! How unfair is that?