Last week saw the traditional Boxing Day hunting events across the country and if you live in the countryside you will not have failed to notice the record number of meetings taking place.

I seem to recall that David Cameron pledged in his 2010 General Election manifesto to repeal the Hunting Act, yet we see that not only has this been ignored, much like many of his ‘cast iron guarantees’, but he is forcing through a gay marriage bill that wasn’t proposed by them, their coalition partners or even the opposition Labour Party.

We must not forget that under the hunting ban, foxes and hares in the wild still need to be controlled and in many cases face much greater suffering with traps and poisons where death is long and painful.

With this in mind, surely it is about time the Hunting Act, perhaps one of the most short-sighted and un-enforceable laws of the New Labour era, was repealed.

Paul Nuttall, UKIP North West MEP and Deputy Party Leader