Hilton Dawson attended The Countryside March in London organised to highlight concerns of people from the countryside.

There were many locals among the estimated 300,000 who attended. One of the main forces behind the campaign, Robin Hanbury-Tenison (chief executive of The Countryside Alliance) claimed the Foster Bill had triggered the event. Why then did Mr Dawson choose to attend? Was it because he supports hunting? No, Mr Dawson has stated that hunting is "cruel" and cannot be part of the "compassionate and caring society" that he wants to help to build. Did Mr Dawson attend then because he cares about the countryside? I would suggest not. My guess is he was forced to attend by his own personal fears about his position as MP. I would suggest Mr Dawson felt he had to be seen at the rally because he's in a dangerous position. As reported in the Sunday Telegraph (March 1), he is one of six Labour MPs in rural seats vulnerable to swings of less than five per cent. The Countryside Alliance, as a focus of its anger, plans to field election candidates at the next election in vulnerable Labour seats. The Lancaster and Wyre seat is therefore one of its most likely targets. Mr Dawson must, understandably, be frightened. At the last election Conservative Keith Mans was just 1,295 votes behind Mr Dawson. The single issue Referendum Party candidate achieved 1,516 votes. Mr Dawson will obviously fear a similar situation. He must, and should, be scared by the power of rural feeling within his constituency. Mr Dawson's actions on Sunday once again illustrate the way in which he is prepared to hijack issues and events to gain positive publicity. In June 1997, Mr Dawson used the handgun free-vote as a publicity stunt, in order to present himself as the MP who "listens" 59,116 voted in the constituency in May 1997. Mr Dawson spoke to just 19 people on his "Handgun Hotline," and went on to claim it as a considerable success. In November 1997 he used the hunting free-vote in a similar way. Beforehand he claimed he would be heavily influenced by the outcome of the meeting and that he was the only MP prepared to decide how to vote using a such a democratic system. When the meeting came to its conclusion the vote produced the result of 206 opposed to the Foster Bill and 34 in favour of it. Mr Dawson, though, voted for the bill and chose to ignore the detailed views given by those who had made the effort to attend. Hilton Dawson is scared by the power of the countryside. His government's actions have not helped him either. People in both the town and the country should take note of his actions. Altering Mr Dawson's election quote of "scratch me and I'm a socialist," I would suggest that Mr Dawson appears as an MP who is concerned and who listens, but once scratched his values and ideas have no substance. He really only has one thing clear in his mind to win his seat again at the next election. "Making it better for us all," (one of his key election pledges) comes a poor second.

Matthew J Steeples

Abbeystead Road

Dolphinholme

Lancaster

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.