What’s The Deal With The Warwickshire Hunt?

So, what happens now after the public release of the protocol, also known as the secret deal between Warwickshire Police and the Warwickshire Hunt?

The police seem to believe things must now move on since the protocol has been released. But can they? And can we? Is it really beyond the realms of possibility that people cannot just move on from this. As if there’s nothing to reflect on or be concerned about – such as, why and how it was ever allowed to happen? What we must remember here is that this was a group of people – the Warwickshire Hunt – who were going to court and appealing an order that had been issued to them by the police regarding anti-social behaviour.

How can you go from being willing to take a group of people to court in order to protect the wider community, to then allowing that same group of people to sign a protocol, which actually benefited them, not the community, was not legally binding and whose contents were kept a secret from the community that originally needed protecting? At what point did the police stop caring about community safety at the expense of protecting a small minority of well-connected and powerful people?

We cannot just move on from this. We have to ask questions as to why this was allowed to happen. What other groups of people are allowed to enter into secret deals with their local police force? This should raise serious questions for everybody, regardless of your views on fox hunting.

What started out as a local anti-social behaviour issue has become a question of police accountability, transparency and policing without fear or favour. A perfect example of two-tier policing, in fact. On the one hand you have a community frustrated by anti-social behaviour issues and on the other a small but powerful group who have enough money and influence to challenge the police in a civil court and to agree secret deals that are kept behind closed doors. Because they have money, power and influence they effectively brought their way out of the judicial system.

Kevin Blowe from NETPOL was quoted as saying:

“…. the secret, cosy deal between the police and the Warwickshire Hunt is unprecedented. We haven’t heard of a similar protocol anywhere else before. This is also the first time that local people’s determination has successfully exposed the police’s lack of transparency and accountability when challenged to explain why arrangements like these were made……….”

Kevin went on to write:

‘Warwickshire Police just needs to publish all correspondence and minutes of meetings between it and the Warwickshire Hunt and let the public decide”.

Warwickshire Police are hoping that the scandal regarding the secret deal will just disappear. They hope that due to its release, which we must all remember came from a relentless public campaign, not through Warwickshire Polices doing that everything can be forgotten.

There are still many questions and answers to this scandal, and we won’t give up.

Please politely contact Warwickshire Police and ask them.to publish all correspondence and minutes of meetings between themselves and The Warwickshire Hunt.

Let us know what response you receive. We all deserve to know the truth.

Thanks to West Midlands Hunt Sabs for this post. You can support their work here westmidlandhuntsabs