Schedule 3 - Hunting with Dogs: Prohibition
Hunting Bill
2:15 pm
Mr Gordon Prentice (Pendle, Labour)
My hon. Friend referred to contract 5, produced by the university of York at Heslington, on the management of the mink population. That tells us that there has been only one study on the effectiveness of hunting with dogs as a means of controlling mink. However, the study ran for five years. It revealed that two-thirds of the mink located by the hounds managed to escape, because they hid away in secure refuges—in rocks or under trees—where the dogs could not get at them. That demonstrates again that hunting mink with dogs is an ineffective method of control.