Double blow for Blair

2003-07-01 08:38

London - British Prime Minister Tony Blair was nursing a double setback on Tuesday after lawmakers voted overwhelmingly to ban fox hunting with dogs in England and Wales and a poll showed he has lost the public's trust.

Against the Labour government's wishes, lawmakers late on Monday backed a total ban on fox hunting by 362 votes to 154, a majority of 208. The defeat came just hours before a poll in the Financial Times revealed two thirds of voters do not trust the British leader.

The loss of public trust comes as Blair stands accused of deliberately exaggerating evidence that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction in order to win support for going to war alongside the United States.

The defeat for Blair over fox hunting followed a dramatic turn of events in Britain's lower House of Commons.

His government had intended for lawmakers to vote on proposals to ban stag hunting and hare coursing while allowing fox hunting under licence.

However following a stormy Commons debate lasting more than five hours, the government withdrew its proposals at the eleventh hour, allowing lawmakers the opportunity to vote on an outright ban to fox hunting -- an issue that has pitted animal rights activists against countryside dwellers who see their way of life under threat.

"Tonight they (Labour) lost control of their own party," the opposition Conservative's spokesperson on the environment David Lidington said following the vote.

"Even (deputy prime minister) John Prescott gave two fingers to Tony Blair and voted for a ban. The government has got itself into an almighty mess, the prime minister has no one to blame but himself," Lidington added.

The pro-hunt lobby

Despite the vote in the Commons, the upper House of Lords - a bastion of the pro-hunt lobby - is expected to vote against an outright ban, as it did in an earlier vote in 2001.

In a separate blow for Blair, a Mori poll in the Financial Times showed 66% of British voters do not trust him, including 38% since the start of the year.

Elsewhere, 30% said they "strongly agree" that Blair is losing his grip while 33% tend to agree.

Only 31% said they were satisfied with Blair's performance as prime minister, against 61% who were not.

Mori interviewed 1 002 adults by telephone between June 20 and 22.

Blair's party is running neck and neck with the Conservatives on 35%, according to the Mori poll of 1 007 adults published at the weekend. The next general election is due by mid-2006 at the latest.

Labour entered government in 1997 with a pledge to ban fox hunting. But following the House of Lords' opposition, it unveiled compromise proposals last December calling for fox hunts to be permitted as long as participants could get a three-year licence on grounds that foxes have become so plentiful as to become pests in their areas.

It followed an unprecedented pro-hunt march last September that saw more than 400 000 demonstrators thronging the streets of central London.

Hunting foxes and stags with packs of barking hounds, with riders in scarlet jackets following on horseback, goes back more than 300 years in Britain, and is widely associated with British aristocracy.

- AFX