The row over the ban on hunting continued yesterday after a Labour MP said the controversial legislation was about "class war".

Peter Bradley, the parliamentary private secretary to rural affairs minister Alun Michael, said pro-ban campaigners should "own up" and admit the legislation was "not just about animal welfare and personal freedom, it was class war".

Bradley argued in an article for the Sunday Telegraph that "it was not class war as we know it".

"It was not launched by the tribunes against the toffs - it was the other way round," he wrote.

"This was not about the politics of envy but the politics of power."

Meanwhile, the Conservatives attacked the motives behind the ban, saying Labour was guilty of a "childish class war".

Home secretary David Blunkett has said the ban will be policed with "sensitivity" and "common sense".