Labour MP met with ‘drink driving’ sab reportedly charged with criminal damage

Labour Party MP for Poole Neil Duncan-Jordan met with members of the North London Hunt Saboteurs (NLHS) at the House of Commons last week to discuss the case for strengthening current fox hunting laws. One of those sabs, Behind The Masks can reveal, is reported to have a criminal record that includes drink driving and criminal damage worth more than £5,000.

According to a picture posted by the NLHS on Wednesday, Mr Duncan-Jordan met with prominent sabs Rhys Giles and Philip Walters as part of what the group described as a presentation to a “cross-party group of MPs” on the abuse of trail hunting.

What the Labour MP may not have been aware of is that Mr Walters, who is the de factor leader of the North London sabs, is alleged to have a serious criminal record stretching back to the early 2000s.

Neil Duncan-Jones MP with Rhys Giles (left) and Philip Walters (right).

According to online sources, Walters was handed a 15-month ban for drink driving in November 2003, as well as a fine for driving an uninsured vehicle in northwest Wiltshire.

A few months later, in March 2004, sources indicate that Walters was given a two-year community rehabilitation order and another three-year driving ban after once again driving without insurance.

Worse still, in 2008, Walters was reportedly charged at Colindale police station with criminal damage and destruction of property worth more than £5,000. He is also believed to have been charged with assault and battery.

BTM is not aware of any charges brought against Walters’ colleague, Mr Giles, although we would argue that his dubious moustache is at the very least criminally offensive. Late last year, our video of the sab went viral, depicting Mr Giles in a field (presumably without permission) playing the sound of hounds in cry to distract them from the scent.

Rhys Giles disturbing a hunt with a recording of hounds in cry.

 Giles hails from Primrose Hill, one of London’s most expensive neighbourhoods, where an average four bed house fetches in excess of £1.2 million. He is also prone to melodrama, telling attendees of the vegan festival Vegfest that he and fellow hunt saboteurs “put themselves between the hunt and their prey”.

Boasting of their trip to the corridors of power, the NLHS repeated sabs' favourite lie that trail hunting "only exists on paper". In fact, official figures show that there have only been 23 criminal convictions for illegal hunting since the ban was enacted. Across some 228,000+ trail hunting days this means that 99.9% of hunts are following the law.

We at BTM wonder whether Mr Duncan-Jordan knows that he is being lobbied by such a dodgy character as Philip Walters. Then again, his fellow Labour Party MP and League Against Cruel Sports supporter Ivor Caplin was recently arrested for attempting to meet up with a 15-year-old boy in Brighton. So who knows where standards have dropped to in the party.