A Trail Hunting Ban Must Not Catch the Working Dog: Our Response to Defra

✅ Key Takeaway: Any new trail hunting ban must be strictly defined to prevent the accidental criminalisation of lawful working dogs, which are essential for upland management and animal welfare.

A gundog trained to find a wounded deer works on animal scent. So, in part, does a trail hound. Our response to Defra’s consultation on banning trail hunting in England and Wales, submitted ahead of the 18 June deadline, is about one thing: making sure any new law can tell those two dogs apart.

Our thanks to members who read the draft and sent comments after our earlier blog. Your input shaped where we pushed hardest.

What this response is, and what it isn’t

The Moorland Association takes no position on trail hunting itself. We have one concern, and we made it the whole of our submission: a ban drawn too widely would criminalise the lawful, daily use of working dogs across the uplands our members manage, over a million acres of England and Wales.

Trail hunting means directing a dog to follow an animal-based scent trail laid for that purpose. Hunting a live wild mammal with dogs is a separate thing, and already illegal under the Hunting Act 2004. The danger is that a vague ban blurs that line and sweeps up work the Government has said it has no intention of touching.

What we told Defra

The working dog is not a trail hound

A definition of trail hunting has to be tight enough to leave out dogs used for shooting, deer management, recovering shot or wounded animals, pest control, gamekeeping, conservation, livestock protection and animal welfare. Many of these dogs are trained on animal scent.

That does not make their work trail hunting, and we want the Bill itself to say so in plain terms, not leave it to guidance that can shift later.

Enforce the law that already exists

Illegal hunting is already banned. We do not accept that a blanket prohibition on trail hunting has been shown to be necessary or proportionate when the people it is really aimed at, those who hunt illegally under cover of a trail, can already be prosecuted.

“Where unlawful hunting occurs, the appropriate response is enforcement of the existing law against those responsible, not wider legislative change that risks affecting lawful land management, working-dog use and existing Hunting Act exemptions.”

Leave the Hunting Act exemptions alone

The Act already exempts the work that keeps the uplands running: flushing to a gun, stalking, retrieval, ratting, lawful below-ground work and animal welfare. This consultation is not the place to reopen or narrow any of it.

Scent training is an animal-welfare tool

A dog trained only on artificial, non-animal scent is slower and less reliable at finding a wounded deer or a shot bird. Restricting animal-based and animal-mimicking scents would do nothing to curb trail hunting; it would leave injured animals unfound for longer. That is the opposite of what an animal-welfare measure should achieve.

Don’t make landowners liable for what they never agreed to

A new offence should bite only where an owner genuinely knew trail hunting was happening and agreed to it, not where someone enters without permission or does something different from what was allowed. Moorland is open, remote and crossed by many access points. An owner cannot watch every acre in real time, and the law should not pretend otherwise.

The real risk is the chilling effect

Even with no prosecution, loose wording costs money and certainty: higher insurance, rewritten access agreements, legal bills, and damage to reputation when lawful land management is mistaken for banned trail hunting. The practical result is members saying no to lawful work simply to stay safe.

No powers through the back door

We oppose any clause that lets ministers tighten the rules afterwards, through guidance, statutory codes or further rules added without a full vote in Parliament. If trail hunting is to be banned, that should be settled openly by Parliament, not expanded quietly once the Act is on the books.

“It does not follow that an otherwise lawful activity should be prohibited in its entirety because some individuals may act unlawfully. Criminal law should be targeted at unlawful conduct, not at lawful activity carried out by others who are not responsible for that conduct.”

What happens next

Our full response is here.

Defra is now weighing the responses. When there is a Bill to read, we will read every word of the drafting, and we will say so plainly if it strays beyond trail hunting.