The League Against Cruel Sports: Campaigning Against Bloodsports Since 1924

The League Against Cruel Sports is the leading UK charity working to expose and end the cruelty inflicted on animals in the name of sport. Founded in 1924, the League successfully uses lawful investigations, lobbying, and campaigning to make a difference in the UK and around the world. Its current campaigns include hunting, bullfighting, snaring, shooting, dog fighting, racing animals, and the badger cull.

The League was established by members of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) who felt strongly that animal cruelty inflicted in the name of sport had to be ended and were frustrated at the organization's lack of action on the hunting issue. The League's goals were to ban fox hunting, otter hunting, stag hunting, hare hunting, and hare coursing in the UK.

Campaigning proved to be a challenge early on because a wealthy and powerful minority enjoyed and protected bloodsports. But in the late 1950s, the League started to gain momentum by investigating hunts and collecting evidence of the cruelty involved. In addition, it acquired woods and fields in the West Country as sanctuaries for hunted animals.

Over the decades, the League Against Cruel Sports has developed effective methods to thwart bloodsports through legislative change, public education, and causing difficulty for the people inflicting cruelty. To accomplish its goals, the League focuses on exposing the barbaric nature of cruel sports and those involved; raising awareness and campaigning for change by lobbying businesses, politicians, and government; helping individuals whose lives are being detrimentally affected by cruel sports and wildlife crime; and holding sanctuary land and sporting rights in heavily hunted areas.

The League's biggest achievement to date is getting hunting banned in England and Wales (Hunting Act 2004) and Scotland (Protection of Wild Mammals Act) after 80 years of campaigning. Other key accomplishments include the constant defense and enforcement of the Hunting Act 2004 and the formation of Team Badger, the coalition of animal welfare organizations campaigning against the 2012 and 2013 badger culls.