Foxhunters should be forced to pay for referendums to save their sport from being banned, Labour MPs are urging.

Their views have been presented to Home Secretary Jack Straw, who is coming under increasing pressure to outlaw foxhunting.

The survey, by the Parliamentary Labour Party's home affairs committee, received responses from 211 out of 325 Backbench MPs.

All bar one wanted to see legislation outlawing hunting with dogs, with 62 per cent calling for an outright ban.

Nearly 60 per cent backed local referendums or saw them as a pragmatic way to achieve a ban.

Nine out of ten of the MPs would only support referendums if they were to opt out of a national ban.

More than 60 per cent of them believe the costs of these polls should be paid by those seeking to hunt.

But Hugh Bayley, junior social security minister and York MP, and Selby Labour MP John Grogan oppose this.

They both would prefer to see an outright national ban. Mr Bayley added: "Referendums would be costly and messy."

If they were held they should be done by an independent body "not paid for by one side of the argument," he added.

Mr Grogan said: "If it is a public referendum, it should be publicly funded."

Ryedale Tory MP John Greenway is also against using referendums since it could mean hunting allowed in one county but not the next.

There is no precedent for this, he says.

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