IT COULD be argued that the Government's handling of fox hunting is symbolic of all of New Labour's failings.

If hunting is cruel, it should be banned. If it is not cruel, it should be left alone. On such a black-and-white issue, says this argument, there can be no middle way - especially as this Government's large majority allows it to be as radical as it dares.

Typically, concludes this argument, after five years of cynically avoiding the issue, the Government is trying to spin its way out of a hole with a fudge designed not to right a wrong but to salve a vocal minority.

Tempting as this argument is, with a heavy heart we support the attempts to find a middle way.

Scotland has already shown the difficulties of finding words to ban fox hunting (incidentally, the biggest injustice of last night's division was that Scottish MPs were able to vote on the future of hunting in England and Wales but English and Welsh MPs had no say in the Scottish Parliament's decision). In Scotland, a townie may yet find himself prosecuted if his dog chases a neighbour's cat or a rabbit on the school playing fields.

It will also be practically difficult to enforce. What will it say about our priorities if hit squads of boys in blue roam the countryside looking for riders in red coats when, night after night, pensioners are beaten in their beds because there aren't enough police on the streets to keep them safe?

What sort of hue and cry will follow the prosecution of the first illegal huntsman? He will become a right-wing martyr, a cause celebre, a new Tony Martin.

A middle way will also send a message to the countryside. There are some in the sticks who believe Britain is in fact two separate nations, the townies and the rurals. This is nonsense. We are one, and although the renewed debate on hunting has again allowed irrational prejudices to surface, it is pleasing that moderate countryside leaders are quietly speaking of the need to compromise.

Finally, a middle way would also prevent the Government from becoming embroiled in a long, debilitating struggle to get a ban through Parliament. It would enable far more pressing problems to receive its undivided attention and time - health, education, law and order to name but a few.

Animal welfare should also be numbered among its priorities, and the indignities of pigs trapped in concrete sties and chickens imprisoned in sunless broilers should be top of the list. These poor dumb creatures suffer wretched lives before being despatched - at least the fox enjoys several years of natural life in the open, even though its end may be a couple of terror-stricken hours.