Warwickshire Police have been trying to hide the details of an agreement they made with the Warwickshire Hunt for years. After a concerted campaign it’s finally been disclosed.
The protocol, which was in place during the 2023/4 hunting season, lists a number of arrangements that are shockingly hunt-friendly.
One agreement, for example, stated that the police would give the Hunt an hour’s notice if officers intended to attend a meet or a hunt. It reads:
“If the Police intend to join all or part of a hunting day, they will arrange to meet with a member of the Hunt management at least one hour before the start of the Hunt to discuss the intended routes/trails.”
This deal is tantamount to the cops promising to give a burglar the heads-up an hour before they intend to try to catch them robbing a house. It’s an agreement that looks suspiciously like it was designed to allow the Hunt to clear up the evidence that they have been illegally hunting mammals with dogs, in breach of the Hunting Act 2004.
The police also agreed to tell the Hunt when they received a complaint from a member of the public and supply that complaint to an email address supplied by the Hunt. The protocol reads:
“As far as the law permits [Warwickshire Police] will relay any credible complaints made by members of the public to the email address supplied by the Hunt as soon as reasonably practicable after the complaints have been received.”
“Secret police protocol gave special treatment to Warwickshire Hunt”
In a statement published on the Network for Police Monitoring (NETPOL) website, West Midlands Hunt Saboteurs (WHMS) expressed concerns that the police may have passed details of those who had made complaints to the Hunt itself and that members of the public may have been identifiable. This is no small matter, Hunts have been convicted of serious attacks on those who oppose them and have attacked people’s homes and property as recrimination for daring to call out their abuse of wildlife.
The police and the Hunt also agreed to hold monthly meetings during the 2023/4 hunting season “to discuss any issues which have arisen”.
WMHS pointed out in their statement that the language of the protocol was deeply pro-hunt. They wrote:
“To understand just how pro-hunt the secret protocol is, you only have to look at the language in it. It talks about “hunting activities hundreds of years old and is a deep rooted British rural culture” but when referring to hunt saboteur groups, it labels them as aggressive, violent and threatening.”
Protect the Wild contacted Warwickshire Police to ask for a comment on the concerns raised by WMHS and others. They pointed us to their December 2024 public statement, but did not comment on their recent publication of the Protocol.
Agreement dragged into the public domain through dogged persistence
Warwickshire Police and Warwickshire Hunt’s secret deal was signed at the same time as a court date for the Hunt to appeal a Community Protection Notice (CPN) – in WMHS’ words – “suddenly vanished”, along with the CPN itself. The public was simply informed that an agreement between the police and the Hunt had been reached.
WMHS members smelled a rat and began to push for the details of the agreement to be released. When the police refused to disclose the Protocol under Freedom of Information legislation, WMHS and others initiated a two-year-long campaign utilising police complaints procedures and attending local Police and Crime Panel meetings. The group highlighted that Philip Seccombe, the Police and Crime Commissioner for Warwickshire, is open about his membership of the pro-hunting Countryside Alliance. In 2024, WMHS decided they had had enough, and initiated a campaign to ‘Vote Seccombe Out!’.
However, Seccombe is still presiding over a review of the controversy relating to the CPN, the Protocol and the relationship with the Warwickshire Hunt.
Local people went to their MPs, and local MP Matt Western called for a public inquiry into the issue. Western told journalists that persons unknown had daubed graffiti on his house and put a nail through the tyre of his car as a result.
“organised crime group”
In December 2024, Channel 4 News broadcast anonymous interviews with Warwickshire Police officers complaining about the preferential treatment given to the hunt. One officer called the Hunt an “organised crime group.”
The protocol was finally disclosed in January 2025. Warwickshire police were forced into revealing the truth by the sheer dogged persistence of local people who were not prepared to let the issue lie. As WMHS wrote, the fact that this document ever saw the light of day is a testament to “people power”.
NETPOL demands further disclosure from Warwickshire Police
Kevin Blowe from NETPOL told Protect the Wild:
“Netpol was keen to publish the guest article from West Midlands Hunt Sabs because the secret, cosy deal between the police and the Warwickshire Hunt is unprecedented. We haven’t heard of a similar protocol anywhere else before. This is also the first time that local people’s determination has successfully exposed the police’s lack of transparency and accountability when challenged to explain why arrangements like these were made. One local MP has called for a public inquiry, but that should not be necessary, as it offers a way for further delay. Warwickshire Police just needs to publish all correspondence and minutes of meetings between it and the Warwickshire Hunt and let the public decide”.
This so-called ‘protocol’ is a truly shocking departure from policing without fear or favour. It reeks of blatant collusion between individuals high up in Warwickshire Police and the Warwickshire Hunt. Protect the Wild would like to congratulate West Midlands Hunt Saboteurs and others in Warwickshire who wouldn’t let this issue go, and were determined to make sure the Protocol was made public.
