HC Deb 21 April 1994 vol 241 cc1025-6
4. Mrs. Anne Campbell

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how much police time was spent in 1992–93 in policing field sports.

Mr. Charles Wardle

This information is not collected centrally. The deployment of police officers to specific duties is a matter for chief officers of police.

Mrs. Campbell

Is not it about time that the Minister allowed a free vote in the House on the legality of field sports, bearing in mind the enormous amount of resources in police time, as well as, of course, the extreme cruelty to wild animals, that would be saved if field sports were banned?

Mr. Wardle

The hon. Lady will know that in the last Parliament there was a debate and a free vote because the Government for their part regard such matters to be matters of individual conscience. I hope that the hon. Lady will welcome the proposals in the Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill which are aimed at all trespassers, including hunters, who wilfully disrupt a lawful activity on land.

Sir Anthony Grant

Is my hon. Friend aware that we could have more policemen on the beat and better use of police time if the police did not have to waste so much effort dealing with cranks and hunt saboteurs who unlawfully interfere with perfectly lawful field sports?

Mr. Wardle

My hon. Friend is right. Indeed, in Cambridgeshire the police deploy a number of people for just such purposes. That ties up police officers who otherwise could be deployed elsewhere. The Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill gives the police powers to direct trespassers to leave land if there are reasonable grounds for believing that they intend to disrupt a lawful activity. It will be a criminal offence to return as a trespasser to that land within three months. The Bill also creates a substantive offence of wilfully disrupting a lawful activity or trying to intimidate someone into not engaging in a lawful activity while he is present as a trespasser on the land.