Labour returns to class war in the countryside

The launch of Labour's 50 point 'Animal Welfare Manifesto' was largely buried by Brexit developments, but that does not improve what is in parts a deeply ignorant document.

Unfortunately, many of the policies have far more to do with partisan politics than they have with improving animal welfare so predictably the two most prominent issues are hunting and grouse shooting. Nobody in the current Labour party seems to have remembered that the last Labour government wasted 7 years and 700 hours of parliamentary time banning hunting, so now it is committing to ban it again, or at least introducing pointless legislation to 'strengthen' the Hunting Act aimed presumably at cleansing the countryside of hunts, whilst doing absolutely nothing for the traditional quarry species. Importantly the focus on hunting also gives an excuse for a couple of pictures of hounds and red coats (even if one pack seems to be in America).

And next on the list to the foxhunter in the current Labour Party's comical view of rural Britain comes the grouse shooter. The document contains a commitment to "implement an independent review into the economic, environmental and wildlife impacts of driven grouse shooting and model alternatives". Although as the Shadow Secretary of State, Sue Hayman, has already decided that "there are viable alternatives to grouse shooting such as simulated shooting and wildlife tourism" it is difficult to see how any review is going to be particularly independent.

One of Ms Hayman's predecessors Peter Bradley MP admitted after the Hunting Act was passed that it was "class war". We need to be clear that the focus on hunting and grouse shooting in this 'manifesto' is also about the politics of prejudice, not the welfare of animals. More than that it is very bad politics.

Last year the Alliance published a joint report with the Fabian Society seeking to reconnect Labour with the countryside. That report delivered some hard truths to the Labour Party, as well as furnishing the party with policy ideas that would genuinely help rural communities. Crucially it advised the Labour Party that if it wanted to start winning in the countryside it needed to stop fixating on animal rights issues and start talking about those that actually matter to people in rural communities. If the new 'Animal Welfare Manifesto' is anything to go by Labour seems determined to ignore the advice of the Fabian report and continue to put class war politics before a relevant agenda for rural communities.