Animal Health and Welfare (Ban on Fox Hunting) Bill 2025: Second Stage [Private Members] Dail Éireann — 2025-12-17 ============================================================ Paul Murphy (PBP), Dublin South-West If the Minister had a problem, he could come back and sum up by saying, “We agree with a ban on fox hunting, but we have a problem with some of the wording and the way it is done”. That is no problem. What would happen is it would be passed on Second Stage and amended on Committee Stage. The point on the ban on trail hunting is there precisely because this has been used in Britain as a way of continuing undercover or underground fox hunting. However, no ban is specified and we support the possibility of the continuation of drag hunting. Let us be real about the argument on pest control. Saoirse McHugh makes a very good point in the newspaper today: “I don't think anybody believes that getting a pack of 50 dogs and 50 people on horseback to chase a single fox to exhaustion is a reasonable or efficient form of pest control.” Foxes are no threat to anyone or anyone's livelihood. They are beautiful, intelligent animals that play a vital role in our ecosystem. Tearing them limb from limb is not a sport. It is not an ancient Irish tradition. It is not a rural pursuit. It is an alien bloodlust, imported into this country by a colonial aristocracy. The Irish Masters of Foxhounds Association was established in 1845 during the Famine, as Deputy Healy noted. While ordinary people were starving to death, there were aristocrats in red coats riding around on horseback, torturing animals to death. That is what this tradition is about. I have to put it to those in Sinn Féin. What are they thinking? What are they thinking about supporting this colonial practice? If they do not come to their senses, if they do not change their party's position on this, I hope at the very least that they will allow a free vote. Surely they know that this is going to be done away with. In 20 years’ time, we are not going to have the continuation of fox hunting in this country. Surely a majority of the Sinn Féin membership supports a ban on fox hunting. I know that those I worked with in the presidential campaign were laughing at Heather Humphreys, her support of rural pursuits and her defence of fox hunting, and they were supporting Catherine Connolly’s opposition to it. Surely some of them will break with the party Whip and vote with the people, who, urban or rural, are overwhelmingly opposed to fox hunting. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2025-12-17/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:29+00:00 Sitting date: 2025-12-17