You're not a country boy, I see.
The fox population, lacking any predator save the automobile, multiplies at a log rate unless it is controlled. The damage that foxes do to a British agricultural system already driven nearly to its knees by foot-and-mouth disease is incalculable: foxes are such determined marauders that they will actually eat lambs that are in the process of being born. Something must be done so that the British farmer doesn't sustain enormous losses from foxes.
Unfortunately, a massive study conducted in the UK last year was unable to find any method of killing foxes that would be less cruel than the hunt. Shooting is usually unsuccessful, trapping and poisoning lead to agonizing deaths, and no method of birth control has been found effective.
Foxes are adorable and cuddly-looking, and it is easy for the urban and suburban British public, which no longer has much knowledge of country life, to sympathize with foxes. Perhaps the class resentments that have always been a part of British life play a role in their distaste for hunting, too; there's a mistaken perception that hunters are a lot of destable toffs. I had a pet fox when I was a child and of course have a great deal of sympathy for these clever, beautiful creatures. But when I saw the bones of lambs outside of fox dens and saw hard-working, tough farm women in tears over the loss of their animals, my sympathy vanished.
Actually, I mention this incident to demonstrate that an undemocratic system can override the democratic one when it wishes.
From what I hear 'lamping' is almost as effective as fox hunting and is a lot less cruel, since the fox gets shot, not torn apart by hounds.