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The League Against Cruel Sports is an animal welfare organisation that campaigns against blood sports such as fox hunting and hare coursing. It also seeks the regulation of greyhound racing and an end to commercial game shooting and trophy hunting.
The League began in Morden, a suburb of London in 1923. Henry Amos raised a successful protest against rabbit coursing and was able to achieve a ban. This encouraged him to organise opposition to other forms of cruel sports and, in 1924, along with Ernest Bell, he established the League for the Prohibition of Cruel Sports. Although many blood sports such as bull, bear and badger baiting and cock fighting had already been outlawed, the laws only applied to domestic and captive animals. With the RSPCA unwilling to take action against hunting, Amos and Bell saw a need for an organisation that would campaign against what they regarded as cruel sports.
The first chairman of the League was Sir George Greenwood, who moved the following resolution at the inaugural public meeting: "This meeting registers its emphatic protest against all sports of hunting an animal to death for human pleasure and calls upon the Government to introduce legislation to prohibit such sports".
The following charter entitled "What We Stand For" was produced:
The League is a membership-based organisation that depends largely on legacies and direct mail packages to raise funds. The corporate structure includes both a charity and a limited company, because some of its party political campaigning would not be allowed under charity law.
The League supported the Protection of Wild Mammals (Scotland) Act, passed in 2002 by the Scottish Parliament, and the Hunting Act 2004. Both laws make it illegal to chase fox with more than two dogs, but allow the use of two dogs (England) or a pack of dogs (Scotland) to flush fox to be shot. [1][2] Both laws allow the use of one terrier at a time below ground to flush a fox to be shot, if the owner of the terrier has written permission from the land owner or occupier to reduce fox populations in order to prevent or reducing serious damage to game birds or wild birds being kept on the land. The terrier must wear an electronic locator collar.
The League is currently campaigning against commercial breeding of non-native game birds for shooting, and against hunts that it believes are continuing to hunt wild mammals contrary to the 2004 ban. It also campaigns to extend hare coursing/fox hunting legislation from Scotland, England and Wales to Northern Ireland. In August 2006, it successfully undertook a private prosecution under the Hunting Act, because the police would not take action, against the huntsman of the Exmoor foxhounds, and argued that this showed that the Hunting Act was clear in its meaning. [3] This prosecution is currently under appeal.
In its campaign to end hunting, the league operates one or more sanctuaries in which deer are protected from hunters. This practice, which runs contrary to generally accepted wildlife management practice has subjected the league to some criticism.[4] In an effort to be kind to the deer, the herd was, at least initially, fed over the winters allowing the size of the herd to grow beyond numbers which the land could support leading to widespread disease including parasites and bovine tuberculosis.[5] Other conservation organizations have worked with the LACS in an effort to help them establish a management plan which would reduce the population of the deer. Ibid. Scientifically based management of the herd, which would include selective culling which runs counter to the purpose of the sanctuary, has been largely rejected by the society. Ibid. The health of the deer population on the LACS sanctuary has reached th point that at least one animal suffering from disease has been killed in what the killer described as a mercy killing.[6]
Amongst the League's supporters are many people who used to follow and take part in hunts. Indeed, the League has produced publications against fox hunting written by a Master of Fox Hounds and by a professional huntsman. On the other hand, in the period 1990 to 2001 a number of high profile members of the League Against Cruel Sports defected to the pro-hunting and "Middle Way" side of the argument, most notably former chief executive Jim Barrington, and former chief officer Graham Sirl (following his forced resignation).
The current President of the League Against Cruel Sport is actress [7] Annette Crosbie who has said: "When I think about it, I think humans are the nastiest species of animal on the planet ...". In the same interview she describes herself as "impatient, intolerant, judgmental, tactless — I'm not very nice, I'm really not. And if you don't do it my way, by God you'll be sorry." [1]
Crosbie says "We believe that nobody has the right to terrorise and kill animals for sport." [8] She supports the actions of animal rights activists, telling The Daily Mirror: "The campaign against Huntingdon Life Sciences has been very clever — to frighten the banks into backing off is wonderful... Apart from rescuing animals they focus people's attention on what's going on. You cannot get politicians to pay attention until you get out on the streets and do something." [1]