Leading West hunt campaigner Giles Bradshaw appears to have got Labour's anti-hunting campaign to agree the ban is flawed.

Mr Bradshaw, from Devon, joined a Labour Party website calling for ideas for changes to the law and Government policy, and is getting support from anti-hunting campaigners to amend the Hunting Act.

He exposed a split in the anti-hunting movement, which stands with two opposing Parliamentary motions over the hunt ban. One asks MPs to back calls for greater enforcement of the ban, and the other demands loopholes hunts have exploited since the 2005 ban to be closed.

Mr Bradshaw's specific argument surrounds the part of the Hunting Act that deals with shooting deer once they have been flushed out.

He said the wording of the law forces him to shoot deer his dogs flush out of woodland, even when he never has the intention of doing so.

The hunt campaigner has never been prosecuted for this, despite trying – he once walked into the League Against Cruel Sports' deer sanctuary and has even written to the police asking to be arrested for doing so.

Parts that need reform

He took his campaign to the LabourSpace website, which party activists use to promote law changes and Government initiatives.

And his call for an amendment to the Hunting Act won support from anti-hunt campaigners.

Gary Hills, from Support the Hunting Ban UK, said: "This was a clause added on the night of the vote by pro-hunting Lords. They put down over 400 amendments to try to run the bill out of time and regrettably that one got through in all the confusion."

Hunt saboteur and monitor Leigh Jones also backed Mr Bradshaw.

"I support the Hunting Act obviously, but there are parts that without a doubt need reforming," he said.

The three main anti-hunt bodies – IFAW, the League Against Cruel Sports and the RSPCA – maintain that the Hunting Act needs stricter enforcement rather than amending to tighten loopholes.

The League has started a campaign to get landowners to pledge not to allow illegal hunting on their land.

"The Hunting Act allows artificial hunting to continue in place of live quarry hunting. Unfortunately, hunting extremists are using drag and trail hunting as a subterfuge for engaging in illegal hunting activities by claiming an accident occurred whilst out drag or trail hunting, and a fox was killed," a spokesman said.

But the Countryside Alliance's chief executive, Simon Hart, said the split in the anti-hunting campaign showed the ban should be scrapped.

"A total of 76 people have been prosecuted under the Act, with 56 found guilty up until the end of 2007. The highest number of prosecutions was not in Leicestershire or Gloucestershire, but on Merseyside – most were likely to have been for hunting rats or rabbits," he said.