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IT was standing room only as more than 100 passionate horse owners packed out Hale Village Hall on Wednesday evening to discuss how they would fight "unacceptable" plans by national park bosses to tighten planning legislation on keeping horses in the Forest.

In a consultation document on the future of the New Forest, the National Park Authority has proposed stricter planning rules requiring planning permission for certain conditions involved in the keeping of horses.

Grazing or keeping of horses?

The draft document, seen as a policy blueprint for the next two decades, distinguishes between grazing of agricultural land, which would not require planning permission and the keeping of horses, a recreational activity and therefore a change of land use requiring planning permission.

The authority describes somebody as a keeper of horses if they have less than one hectare of land per horse, have subdivided a single field into paddocks or they have stables, maneges or field shelters, equine equipment such as jumps and rings and corrals for tacking up horses.

If horses require regular supplementary feeding or "rugging up" through winter, then this is classified as horse keeping as opposed to grazing.

Some of those present expressed concern that the value of their equestrian properties would drop if planning permission for keeping horses was refused.

Fears over laminitis

Others were worried about their horses suffering laminitis, a painful and crippling condition of the feet, which can be brought about from eating too much grass.

Vet Fiona McDonald said this was a possibility if one pony was kept in a field as big as one hectare, a condition to be satisfied to avoid planning permission.

Ms McDonald added: "We who live in the New Forest are more passionate than anybody about preserving its unique character but we feel that the National Park Authority has other priorities."

Graham Ferris, Chairman of the New Forest Equestrian Association, said: "Tonight's meeting demonstrated once again the enormous strength of feeling there is in New Forest people who own and ride horses.

"They feel that these proposals from the National Park Authority are totally unacceptable and we are determined that they will not be implemented in their present form."

A spokesman for the New Forest National Park authority said: "These policies are in draft and we are asking for comments on the policies themselves and not information they have read or heard elsewhere.

"Some people are concerned about the draft Recreational Horse keeping policies. The Plan explains why these draft policies have been included to help address the landscape and land management issues that can arise from recreational horse keeping.

It also contains background on how to interpret them, which is based on work by SEEDA's Equestrian Champion on recreational horse keeping in protected landscapes. People can comment on the plan via the National Park website, or by viewing reference copies at the authority's headquarters at South Efford House or local council offices.

2:06pm Wednesday 8th October 2008

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