It will come as no surprise to hunt supporters that the major anti-hunting charity the League Against Cruel Sports (LACS) is embarking on a malicious campaign against much-loved country pubs.
Its latest scheme is to send threatening letters accusing pubs that host hunts of “condoning illegal behaviour” – even though they know full well that trail hunting, as practiced by BHSA-registered hunts, is legal under the Hunting Act 2004.
LACS knows what it is doing by saying the pub is “at risk of alienating the majority of the public”. At Behind The Mask we believe the majority of the British public are decent, honest citizens who want to support their local pubs (especially in rural areas) and care far more that there’s a reliable, welcoming place for their post-work pint or Sunday roast than whether or not a pub allows members of a local hunt through its doors.
But there is a malicious sab-supporting minority who love nothing more than an online pile-on of rural businesses that support hunts. The phenomenon was reported on by The Times in 2017 but has only grown as more pubs and restaurants rely on social media to advertise and make bookings. Now, in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis, saboteurs are holding local businesses hostage to their radical agenda.
In 2017, the Crown & Plough, an independent countryside pub in Long Clawson, Leicestershire, received an onslaught of online criticism from suspected saboteurs for the unforgiveable crime of hosting some local hunts for lunch.
These charming sentiments were accompanied by one-star reviews, decreasing the public house’s overall rating on Facebook. Worse still, landlady Jo Towle received numerous threatening phone calls from sabs after she agreed to host a pie night for the Belvoir hunt.
A similar incident occurred in May 2023 when an animal rights activist tarred the Manor House Inn near Callington, Cornwall, with one-star reviews on TripAdvisor. The pub’s chef, Joss Beechim Horton told The Sunday Telegraph, “I feel worried about how much damage he could do… We work very hard and barely scraped through the pandemic. Now with spiralling costs, I fear that he has the ability to affect our trade.”
To make it worse, this comes at a time when pubs up and down the country are seriously struggling, particularly in rural areas. More than 500 pubs closed for good in Britain last year, equating to a loss of 6,000 jobs. Young people often struggle to find work in the countryside at the best of times and hunt saboteurs aren’t making it any easier.
LACS’ letter – meant solely to intimidate a rural business – is hinting at what may be to come for this pub.
And it’s not the only organisation trying to destroy the economic fabric of the British countryside. Protect the Wild has launched a new website that lists businesses that support hunting with hounds or shooting: “everything from retailers to pubs and hotels, suppliers and digital media”.
Protect the Wild and LACS know that actions like this will encourage boycotts of these businesses which will only serve to further cripple a rural economy that is already on its knees. This is shameful behaviour.