Henry called by the Countryside Alliance’s HQ in London.
He’d heard that the current CEO Lieutenant General Sir Barney White-Spunner is stepping down after the AGM in September, to be replaced by the current Director of Campaigns, Tim Bonner (see here).
Previous Countryside Alliance CEOs have included Alice Barnard, whose views on hen harrier persecution weren’t very well informed – see here.
White-Spunner’s views on hen harriers weren’t well publicised, although incomer Bonner is known to be a strong supporter of brood meddling (see here) and has vigorously disputed the evidence that Bowland Betty was shot (see here). He’s recently been spending a lot of time heading a campaign to lobby the police to ‘unmask animal rights thugs’ – it’s not known if that campaign also includes a call for the unmasking of armed gamekeepers involved in criminal animal abuse (see here, here and here).
The petition to ban driven grouse shooting has passed the 6,000 mark today – add your name HERE
Raptor Persecution UK 
I hope Henry’s washed his hands….
” if a bit frustrated by the vagaries of the SNP…”
How dare those democratically elected Scots represent their constituents in parliament!
Marco, what do you mean?
It was a comment made by some Mancroft bloke in the CA article linked to above, regarding White-Spunner’s step down, and his obvious displeasure that democratically elected Scottish MPs to the UK parliament, should be able to vote or comment on a UK parliament vote on foxhunting.
Less than a year ago, the people of Scotland were begged to stay in the union, as we were supposedly Better Together, yet now the government and its establishment buddies would simply prefer that the entire electorate of Scotland should not be allowed any representation in the Houses of Parliament, and any participation by their democratically elected MPs should be stopped.
That is, of course, with the exception of the three unionist MPs who will inevitably kowtow to the establishment way of thinking – [Ed: the rest of this comment has been deleted]
Yes I and many 100’s of us north of the border wrote to our MP’s asking that they vote, even though in this instance it was an English/Welsh only legislation, we like the SNP, felt that animal welfare (see Merlin’s excellent comment below) is far more important than political and country borders.
[Ed: sorry, Marco, but this is clearly off topic]
sorry for going off topic guys but would just like to bring this to your attention, its on the news tonight.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/28/walter-palmer-dentist-accused-killing-cecil-lion-upset-hunter-zimbabwe,
its basically along the same lines as driven shooting, you pay a large amount of money and pick an animal you want to kill, some animals are caged others enticed by food into the open. you take your shot and then boost your ego by going telling your like minded friends just how good a hunter you are and you pretend this is sporting. (Wildlife photographer of the year had a photographic essay on caged shooting last year if my memory serves me right)
(also to be fair on other “true sports” and not to drag them into the levels of driven shooting, a sport generally has a defined set of rules and encourages fair play and honesty)
Its interesting to look how the authorities are reacting though, even in what we would describe respectfully as a third world nation they have the intelligence to depict the difference between right and wrong. They have the intelligence to know that protecting wildlife instead of blasting it away is far more important and can provide much more rewards both spiritually and financially. But the most important point is that as in the rest of mainland Europe even third world countries take wildlife crime far much more serious than we do. Whilst we might have the financially strongest wildlife organisations in the world we are completely out of touch with the rest of the world in backing our own wildlife
Well said Merlin
I wouldn’t consider it off-topic, because dealing with the mindset of the “trophy hunter”, is very similar to the mindset of the “sport shooter”. They obviously have some form of inbuilt inadequacies that dictate that in order to compensate, they must inflict pain and suffering on defenceless creatures. I honestly cannot think of any other reason why anyone would choose to kill creatures for fun, so I suppose it’s over to the trophy hunters and sport shooters for their reasons as to why they act in this manner. And just in case anyone misinterprets anything, I have no objection to hunters who shoot for the pot, especially if it is carried out in a sustainable manner.
And I fully agree on your take on the definition of sport, Merlin. A sport should comprise of fair play (as you suggest), between two opposing players or teams of a generally similar structure, hence why in boxing for example, you won’t get a flyweight competing against a super heayweight in a fight. There is nothing sporting whatsoever about driven shooting or canned hunting.
There’s a Care2 petition, calling on the government of Zimbabwe to stop issuing such hunting permits.
See here http://www.thepetitionsite.com/821/738/351/demand-justice-for-cecil-the-lion-in-zimbambwe/
And Avaaz also have a petition calling on European and American leaders to ban the importation of animal trophies.
See here https://secure.avaaz.org/en/stop_the_lion_hunt_46/?cstCnbb
I wonder if the Countryside Alliance were involved in the making of this video? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBdynKIJdRg
Can’t access Mark Avery’s website or blog. Has he been “taken down” or have the sites crashed because of excess interest. He had lots of “dislikes” on Henry’s Day 75. Has he been sabotaged by Countryside Alliance?
Countricide Alliance