To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to protect hares; and what assessment she has made of the potential merits of the introduction of a closed season for hare hunting.

This Government recognises the need to protect hares and the importance of tackling rural crimes such as hare coursing. Hare coursing and wider poaching activity is a UK wildlife crime priority, and a national police-led group is in place to help tackle this illegal activity. Defra is providing £424,000 in 2024-2025 for the National Wildlife Crime Unit, which helps prevent and detect crime against hares by obtaining and disseminating intelligence, and directly assisting law enforcers in their investigations.

Where a close season for hares is concerned, the Government considers the need for this measure is justified by animal welfare as well as biodiversity and species conservation. In short, a close season should reduce the number of adult hares being shot in the breeding season, which runs from February to October, meaning fewer leverets are left motherless and vulnerable to starvation and predation. A close season is consistent with Natural England's advice on wildlife management that controlling species in their peak breeding season should be avoided unless genuinely essential. Defra Ministers support the ambition to introduce a close season for hares in England and are considering how this can be brought forward.