Hunt's police threat to quit
Nov 22 2004 By Paul James, The Journal
Blair effigy hanged
Growing fury in the countryside over the Government's ban on fox hunting was graphically displayed yesterday - as an effigy of Tony Blair was hung from an executioner's scaffold.
A near-lifesize dummy of the Prime Minister - with a Tony Blair rubber mask and dressed in a blue shirt and grey trousers - was strung up at historic Winter's Gibbet near the village of Elsdon, Northumberland.
It was placed on the roadside scaffold days after MPs in the House of Commons forced through the ban on hunting with hounds, which will come into effect in February unless a legal challenge is successful.
The hanged effigy of the Prime Minister was accompanied by the slogan: "Fight prejudice, fight the ban," and was put in place by pro-hunting supporters, many of whom have pledged to break the law and continue with their sport.
Dozens of motorists were stopping to look at the gibbet, which stands on National Trust land on Whiskershields Common.
Yesterday Richard Dodd, North-East director of the Countryside Alliance, said: "I got a call this morning telling me about this.
"Although it is nothing to do with the Countryside Alliance, it is a demonstration of the depth of feeling in the countryside."
