Hunting Act 2004
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| Long title | An Act to make provision about hunting wild mammals with dogs; to prohibit hare coursing; and for connected purposes. |
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| Citation | 2004 c 37 |
| Territorial extent | England and Wales |
| Dates | |
| Royal assent | 18 November 2004 |
| Commencement | 18 February 2005 |
| Text of statute as originally enacted | |
| Revised text of statute as amended | |
The Hunting Act 2004 (c 37) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which bans the hunting of wild mammals (notably foxes, deer, hares and mink) with dogs in England and Wales; the Act does not cover the use of dogs in the process of flushing out an unidentified wild mammal, nor does it affect drag hunting, where hounds are trained to follow an artificial scent.
The Act came into force on 18 February 2005. The pursuit of foxes with hounds, other than to flush out to be shot, was banned in Scotland two years earlier by the Protection of Wild Mammals (Scotland) Act 2002. Such hunting remains permitted by the law in Northern Ireland, where the Act does not apply.
Several UK laws on animal welfare, such as the Protection of Animals Act 1911, the Protection of Badgers Act 1992 and the Wild Mammals (Protection) Act 1996 contained specific exemptions for hunting activities, thereby preventing prosecutions of other hunts activities that might otherwise have been considered cruel.
Many earlier attempts had been made to ban hunting. Two private member's bills to ban, or restrict, hunting were introduced in 1949, but one was withdrawn and the other defeated on its second reading in the House of Commons. The Labour government appointed the Scott Henderson Inquiry to investigate all forms of hunting. Opponents of hunting claimed that the membership of the committee was chosen to produce a pro-hunting report. The inquiry reported its view that "Fox hunting makes a very important contribution to the control of foxes, and involves less cruelty than most other methods of controlling them. It should therefore be allowed to continue."
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