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In August 1997 the Socialist Standard wrote (half) jokingly, of the
imminent demise of the quaint rural past-time of hunting landowners.
Half, that is, because the joke contained some truth on the matter of
the contretemps over the banning of fox hunting which will come
(finally) into force next month.
Much fuss has been made about banning this blood-sport, its supporters
twisting and turning, saying one minute it’s a cultural past-time, the
next it’s an economic necessity of farming life. Either way, it’s
by-the-by. What is interesting is the raw process of power involved in
this debate.
Under any normal circumstances, such a Bill – like the banning of
dangerous dogs (under the Tories), or the banning of raves (also under
the Tories), or any other sundry such measures that restrict the mythic
beast of personal choice – would have been nodded through parliament
after a swift and enjoyable debate. With foxhunting, however, the inner
secrets of the British constitution were revealed in all their ugly
goriness as the New Labour hounds tore into the privileges of the
owners of vast tracts of land who wanted the right to literally be a
law unto themselves.
Under ordinary conditions, most legislation and acts of government are
passed by the passive (at least) co-operation of the responsible
bodies. For example, in the direct democratic aspects of the
constitution of California, if the Lieutenant General does not oppose
an initiative going to referendum it is much easier to have the vote –
as in the recent one on stem-cell research held there in November. It
could still be forced through, but unless the issue is strongly
desired, most people wouldn’t bother to fight against the grain.
At least in California, though, the electorate have a chance of voting
for new officials. With the House of Lords, the British legislature has
the remnants of the descendants of cronies and toadies of monarchs past
mixed with the cronies and toadies of top-politicos today. The toadies
of kings past also have the advantage of owning the country – a kind of
fringe benefit – and the latter-day toadies like to hang out with these
wealthy landowners. The incentive for resisting encroachments onto
their eminent domains is clear.
Posture politics
Add to the mix the quest of the increasingly marginalised Tory party to
find a solid political base from which to challenge a government that
tries to pretend to represent the whole nation, and you have a recipe
for government attempts to compromise with the uncompromisable,
reconcile the irreconcilable, and the spectacle of hard-done-by
landowners taking to the streets under the banner of the “Countryside
Alliance”. And, after themselves banning raves and pitbulls, of
the Tory party now crying out about restricting personal cultural
liberties and who weep about the unnecessary slaughter of dogs.
 
That is a recipe for the most debased, ridiculous, irrelevant and
futile posture politics stirred up by has-been politcos on the make,
squabbling over the crumbs of power. That hundreds of hours of
parliamentary time apparently needed to be spent over banning
foxhunting, as compared to the single vote needed to launch a murderous
war, shows where the priorities of these disinterested Lords and their
Commons co-conspirators really lie.
The whole history of the House of Lords has been one of the rich and
powerful trying to retain a voice and a vote to protect their vested
interests against democracy. It had nothing to do with organically
evolved institutions, rationally devised systems of checks and
balances, and everything to do with shabby compromises and naked
self-interests of the landed elite demanding their place in the
legislature. Every twist of their fight with the Commons has come from
their naked self-defence of their property – most famously with the
Irish and other Lords conspiring to defeat Gladstone’s Home-Rule Bills
in the late nineteenth century.
The first Parliament Act of 1911 came when the Lords tried to block a
Liberal budget. They are only supposed to be able to delay legislation
for two years under that Act (and now after the Act under the Atlee
government, only one year). However, in a busy parliament, any delay
means disrupting the whole schedule for other bills, and so can mean
wreckage of any plans it wouldn’t be worth putting up a fight over.
After the Atlee government, the Lords agreed not to vote on anything
contained in a government election manifesto, a concession to
democratic legitimacy in order to be able to keep their undue place in
the halls of the legislature. When New Labour removed (most of) the
hereditary peers, they declared themselves no longer bound by this
agreement, and began to make life difficult for the government. Hence
why it has taken eight years to pass this Act.
The Countryside Alliance now is set to challenge the legitimacy of the
Parliament Act 1945 – the power that finally allowed the Government to
force the Act through despite Lords opposition – on the grounds that it
wasn’t passed properly (the Lords never voted on it). Sixty years late,
they discover this idea. If they can’t win under the rules, they
try and change the rules.
The government has pledged to continue with its reform of the Lords,
removing the last vestiges of hereditary peerage, but keeping the likes
of Lord Sainsbury – a man who gave millions of pounds to the Labour
Party, with nothing in return save a peerage and a ministerial post.
In Scotland, where the new Parliament is not bound by an un-elected
second chamber, a bill banning hunting was passed with ease, and,
strangely, the world hasn’t come to an end. A stark illustration of the
power exerted by the Lords in the British Parliament.
Hereditary property rights
The landed rich cannot begin to conceive that their will cannot run
untrammelled. Representatives of the hunts have talked of landowners
exerting their property rights, and withdrawing co-operation from
national infrastructure. Withdrawing co-operation with the army (so
much for their vaunted patriotism); withdrawing access to land holding
electricity pylons railways and waterways. Some have even called for
civil disobedience. They have claimed the police will not be able to
enforce the Act (something the police deny), which is again betraying
their usual stance that law and order must be respected (and also
forgetting that the police could just turn up to their houses and serve
warrants on them).
We have already seen their civil disobedience – abandoning cars in the
street, storming parliament, fighting with the police in ways that
could only impress hardened direct actionist anarchists (indeed, London
Class War in the Autumn 2004 edition of their paper have called upon
the pro-hunters to, erm, bring it on). Yet, they escape with only a
slapped wrist compared with anarchists who get heavily fined and locked
up.
The BBC have contacted various utility companies to find out what the
ramifications for the withdrawal of co-operation would be. The answer
is, whilst it could make life difficult, if withdrawal of co-operation
were to conflict with operational needs of the electricity, rail or
waterways, then there is legislation for them to force access. The
landowners could be shocked, again, to find themselves at the wrong end
of a copper’s truncheon.
They retain their faith in the holy rights of property, of the power of
property holds to exert influence in society. They forget that the
power of property rests upon the political power to enforce it, and now
the law is for once against them, they don’t like it. Much as they
don’t like the right to roam, for ordinary people to walk across their
vast open spaces that they have a piece of paper saying they own.
The sad thing in all of this – apart from the genuinely moving look of
surprise and hurt that hunt supporters have when they discover the
police can be a bit nasty – is that many of them feel genuinely,
passionately moved by this ban. Some have been heard to say in
interviews that this is the first political issue they have ever felt
strongly or passionately about. So, never mind thousands dying in war,
millions dying of preventable diseases, the AIDS pandemic, millions
dying every year of starvation, privation, squalor, poverty, meanness
and misery in every town bred by poverty. The right to hunt foxes is
what exercises them.
The countryside should not be a preserve of a tiny minority, shouldn’t
be a source of division or overweening power. Disputes should be
settled democratically, without tiny rich groups having more say than
others. All of this just serves to show how the nexus of power and
privilege that is part and parcel of capitalism prevents those sensible
sentiments being carried out. The attempts of the rich and the powerful
to maintain their power over making the rules and laws of society is an
affront that serves to illustrate how shallow democracy under
capitalism really is.
A telling strength of the remaining power of aristocratic privilege, is
that at the dawn of 2005, we have still had to devote some 1500 words
to discussing people in silly costumes hunting foxes at great expense
and waste.
PIK SMEET
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