SIR – There were two letters in the Worcester News about fox hunting on January 6.

While broadly agreeing with the more objective comments made by Councillor Amos ‘Fox hunting isn’t about keeping numbers down’, I have to say the needlessly personally offensive tone of his comments toward the hunt supporters tends to overshadow the very good and valid points he otherwise makes.

The moral argument against hunting stands on its own merits and those who support hunting are demeaned in the eyes of the rest of normal society by their own lack of compassion without the need to state the blindingly obvious regarding their personal failings as human beings.

Coun Amos is wrong to imply it is a class issue – it isn’t, it’s a matter of what is morally right or wrong.

There was and remains widespread support for the ban from all sectors of society which is why hunting with dogs was banned in the first place.

Mr [Simon] McCullough’s less emotive letter ‘No, not all farmers welcome fox hunting’ makes the point regarding the tedious and predictable nature of this debate.

Most people are against hunting, of that there can be no doubt. The activity of hunting with hounds is illegal and it is up to the authorities to ensure the law is enforced; there are no acceptable excuses to allow anyone regardless of what strata of society they come from or how self-important they feel within their own small and insular groups to break the law.

I share Coun Amos’s disappointment that you have chosen to give a twopage spread to what appears to be the glorification of fox hunting (Worcester News, December 27) and encouraging a small group of people who are constantly trying to find ways to bend the law.

I find these pictures every bit as repellent as I do any other form of barbarity, be it to animals or human beings and I am sure the vast majority of Worcester News readers feel the same way.

TIM PALMER
Worcester