Horse & Hound is urging hunt supporters everywhere to boycott high street toiletries chain Lush after it announced a £50,000 fund-raising campaign to support the Hunt Saboteurs Association (HSA).
At the height of anti-hunt protests in the 1980s and 90s this paramilitary wing of the hunt protestors was the scourge of hunts around the country, clad in ski-masks and targeting even the youngest supporters.
Lush launched a Fabulous Mrs Fox bubble bar on Monday to raise money for the group, causing a wave of anger from hunt supporters.
The bar features a “blood-red fox pawprint” design and contains citronella, a scent chosen because “hunt sabs use it to disguise foxes’ scent and send hounds off the trail”, according to Lush.
Jill Grieve of the Countryside Alliance said: “We haven’t seen this level of anger from the hunting community since the Hunting Bill was going through parliament.
“To see such a blatant animal rights agenda on the high street will sicken and infuriate anyone who witnessed the true extent of the HSA’s criminal activity, intimidation and thuggery over the years.
“Lush may well have swallowed the HSA’s propaganda, but country people know exactly what is going on behind the balaclavas.”
H&H editor Lucy Higginson added: “Anyone who has ever heard hunt sabs target small children with obscene language – hoping their parents will no longer allow them out hunting to face such abuse – will be repulsed by this decision.
“I hope hunt supporters will alert their friends to this move and never darken Lush’s doors again.”
Company ethics manager Hilary Jones told H&H that Lush believes the Hunting Act is not being policed properly and the HSA needs support to do this.
She claimed to be unaware of the HSA’s violent past.
Lee Moon, press spokesman for the HSA, said money raised by Lush would go towards “non-violent action to save the lives of foxes”.
This article was first published in Horse & Hound (15 October, ’09)
