Countryside Alliance concerned by Cheshire PCC's wasteful hunting campaign

On Monday 25^th February, Cheshire's police and crime commissioner held a public scrutiny meeting to discuss the policing of hunting in Cheshire. More than 70 local residents attended the meeting at Cheshire Constabulary headquarters in Winsford and almost 200 questions from members of the public were submitted ahead of this. Countryside Alliance Head of Hunting Polly Portwin and Police Liaison Officer Phil Davies were in attendance.

During the meeting the commissioner, David Keane, took the opportunity to scrutinise Cheshire Constabulary's newly appointed chief constable, Darren Martland, following an independent review into how the force polices illegal hunting and offences relating to it. Mr Keane commissioned the review of fox hunting across Cheshire in 2018. The full report and its 11 recommendations can be found here.

The Alliance contributed to the review and supported its findings. During the meeting Mr Keane, however, brought forward new proposals which were not recommended by the review and which are completely unjustified.

Countryside Alliance Chief Executive, Tim Bonner said: "The Cheshire hunts operate entirely legally and have always co-operated with the police. They are not, however, going to be dragged into the ignorant and wasteful campaign which the Police and Crime Commissioner is pursuing. The PCC commissioned an expensive independent review of the policing of hunting, it made sensible recommendations, but those did not suit his political agenda so now he has made up some others. The real question Mr Keane should be asking is how he is going to justify the ridiculous waste of money and diversion of resources from real crime which is resulting from his obsession with hunting."