Failure to support hunting loses the rural vote

sir – It is hard to believe there are senior figures in the Conservative Party who seriously think that it lost its majority at the election because of its stance on hunting, rather than as a result of a campaign poorly conceived, executed and led.

Hunting is uniquely controversial, but in the Conservative Party it is not totemic, as it is in Labour. This is not because socialists love animals more than capitalists, but because they hate Tory toffs like me, and think, erroneously, that hunting is the last bastion of the upper classes.

The commitment in the 2016 Conservative manifesto to repeal the Hunting Act was virtually identical to that in every manifesto since the Act was passed. Theresa May’s commitment was no different from that of David Cameron, and the party leaders that preceded him. This is not because they personally love hunting – I think we can safely assume that Mrs May is not a keen closet fox-hunter.

Every piece of research on voting shows that hunting is a statistically insignificant issue: virtually no one changes their vote on this issue alone, and the vast majority of voters have no interest in it at all.

Where it does have an effect is in rural seats. Labour, with entrenched prejudices about animal rights and the rural way of life, holds not a single rural constituency, whereas the Conservative Party, with an army of activists recruited from the hunting community, increased its majority in many rural seats against the national trend – particularly seats held by candidates who openly supported hunting.

Opposing hunting will not win Labour an election, but failure to support it may cost the Conservatives dear.

Lord Mancroft

Chairman, Masters of Foxhounds Association; Deputy Chairman, Countryside Alliance

London SW1