EAST Lancashire MPs Gordon Prentice and Peter Pike have urged the government to bring in a new Bill to ban hunting with dogs.

They are dismayed that while the Queen's Speech outlining the government legislative programme for the next 18 months promises action to end the blood sport there is no specific pledge to bring back the Bill which ran out of time in the House of Lords before the June 7 General Election.

Pendle MP Mr Prentice and Burnley's Mr Pike want the government to re-introduce the measure -- overwhelmingly backed by the House of Commons -- and force it through Westminster's Upper Chamber if the Lords try to obstruct it again using the Parliament Acts.

They are among 157 Labour backbenchers to sign a Commons motion looking forward to "an early attraction of an enabling bill'' expressing their "continued determination to secure a total ban on hunting wild mammals with dogs within the next 12 months''.