Can someone explain what it is that I am missing here - I am totally at a loss.
I'm not taking any sides here (for or against angling) and I'm going to try to be completely apolitical. I have fished myself, but don't at present, but would like to be able to do so in order to catch fish for food and at times I do suffer moral doubts about the validity of a catch and return style of fishing.
I have seen figures that say that more people go angling on a Saturday afternoon than go to a football match (figures of up to 3 million anglers in the UK) and, if we take a very simplistic view of society, I think that a very large number of anglers come from what would traditionally be 'the working class'. For any political party to come down against angling would be to risk alienating a large portion of the electorate.
I think that the view of 'the general public' is that the other field sports (hunting, shooting, etc.) are carried out by the upper echelons of society and are therefore seen as the trappings of privilege and wealth, and that the numbers that take part in these activities are therefore smaller. There is, perhaps, some element of class warfare in the opposition to these field sports and there are, perhaps, less votes to be lost by the political parties in banning or restricting them.
Angling is relatively inexpensive to carry out with a basic set of kit, and is therefore affordable to many people. I stand to be corrected on this, but my understanding is that shooting rights, salmons rights, etc. do cost quite a lot and are therefore less affordable for the general public.
It may, therefore, be that angling is the only means in this highly regulated country that the elusive 'man in the street' can satisfy some of his desires as a hunter, even though he has to return what he catches. Although it is by no means universal, I think that many anglers really do care about the fish that they catch and, given that they have caught it with a pointed hook, will treat the fish with care and respect as they return it to the water. The only analogy I can think of for this is the soldier who does everything he can to kill or wound an enemy soldier, but if he comes across a wounded enemy he will then do all he can to save him.
Geoff