AGRICULTURE minister Ben Bradshaw's unusual, but welcome, U-turn on open general licences for shooting pigeons and crows obscures a more worrying approach by this Government towards shooting. In their 2001 manifesto Labour promised it had "no intention whatsoever of placing restrictions on the sports of angling and shooting".

Yet the truth is that indirectly, but steadily, shooting has been interfered with. Had it not been for the intervention of rural groups the damage may have been even more substantial.

The draft Animal Welfare Bill contains a number of proposed and unnecessary measures that would impact heavily on the rearing of game, and thus the viability of most British game shooting and associated industries.

The Home Office firearms review hints at restrictions on the age young people can use weapons and the number of guns an individual may own.

The Hunting Act, not the Government's finest piece of work, contains restrictions in the way a gamekeeper can use a dog to control pests. The Government said it would allow hunting to continue under licence, but could not control its own party, the result being a ban of sorts.

We know a significant number of backbenchers hate shooting just as much as hunting and for much the same reason - the sight of a tweed coat provokes much the same old prejudices as the sight of a red one.

John Haigh,

Countryside Alliance regional director,

Northallerton Road,

Thirsk.

Updated: 09:33 Wednesday, March 16, 2005