PM right to ditch fox-hunting ban vote, says Patel
BORIS JOHNSON was correct to focus on Conservative manifesto pledges to tackle climate change ahead of historically important issues such as the fox-hunting ban, Priti Patel has said.
The Home Secretary said it was “the right thing to do” to use the party’s blueprint for government to focus on environmental issues.
The Conservative Party completed a break with its historic support base in the countryside by dropping its long-standing plan to give MPS a chance to repeal the fox-hunting ban from its general election manifesto.
The manifesto, published at the weekend, contained no reference to reviewing hunting laws, for the first time since Tony Blair introduced the ban in 2004.
Instead it contained a simple statement that a new Tory government “will make no changes to the Hunting Act”. This compared with 2017 when the manifesto pledged to “grant a free vote”. The 2010 and 2015 policy documents contained a similar pledge.
Animal rights campaigners hailed the manifesto, which included a commitment to new laws on animal sentience with some detecting the influence of Mr Johnson’s girlfriend, Carrie Symonds, an environmental campaigner.
Speaking to Chopper’s Election Podcast, Ms Patel said that farmers wanted to talk about “environmental stewardship, and how we do the right thing for our country, our environment for the next generation”.
She added: “We are the thought-leaders on this. We are putting the legislation in place when it comes to plastics, when it comes to oceans, when it comes to environmental stewardship, as well. This is the space that we are in, and it is right that we are doing that.”
Ms Patel also backed Mr Johnson after he dropped a promise to lift the threshold for those paying 40 per cent income tax from £50,000 to £80,000 a year. She said: “We are at that stage when we want to support those on the lowest incomes.”