It's not often the Countryside Alliance has much in the way of positive news to shout about. Well, to clarify I'm sure they think so but since terrorising and killing wild animals doesn't exactly resonate with the public I'm sure they take a 'the less said about that the better' approach in their press office.
Once you've discarded the amount of nonsense they produce about the League the volume of positive media stories to emerge from their press office is really rather sparse. I've often wondered how many staff they have working solely on ' the LACS' as they like to refer to us, or maybe this job is reserved for the work experience given the standard of drivel they produce.
Anyway, you can imagine the excitement in CA HQ when they actually had a story which didn't involve killing wild animals - ok it does involve chasing but we can't expect miracles now. You can just imagine them running around like headless chickens tripping over each other in their haste to send out their press release and start ringing round news desks to proclaim the good news. It puts me in mind of my dog when you produce his lead at walk time when he starts charging around the house and chasing his tail.
The story I'm referring to, if you are not fortunate enough to read their Grass e-routes or wait for it... the Northern Echo which reported this story, is that of a huntsman who assisted the police in a high speed car chase. The hunter in question handed over his land rover to allow the police to chase criminals across the countryside and advised the police on the lie of the land. No, before you jump to conclusions it wasn't hunters being chased these were people wanted in connection with car offences.
Now this all seems like a very honourable thing to do and the hunter in question deserved to be acknowledged for his part in this but what I can't understand is the need to point out he is a hunter. Are hunters the only people who have four by fours capable of driving across rough terrain? Are hunters the only people who know the countryside well enough to advise the police on their chase? I would have thought 'follow that car'' would have been enough instruction but you never know. I doubt very much this is the case but perhaps the idea of a law abiding hunter is so foreign to the CA they couldn't contain their excitement.