It was inevitable, once the new government was established, that special interest groups delighted or appalled by policy promises made during the campaign would want to know what they could expect. And top of the list of what might loosely be styled "minorities' policies" was the Conservative promise to allow a free vote on the repeal of the 2004 Hunting Act, which bans hunting with dogs.

It didn't take the League Against Cruel Sports (LACS) long to raise the issue. Yesterday, even before David Cameron and Nick Clegg had finished appointing all the coalition's ministers, the animal welfare charity was hailing the campaign to bring back hunting as "dead." It may well be right, though not necessarily for the reasons it claims. LACS polled just under 60 per cent of the MPs returned to Westminster and used a guesstimate to suggest how the rest of the Commons might vote. From their figures they say 328 MPs would oppose the repeal of the Hunting Act with 293 in favour. That's a pretty narrow majority and it would take only 17 or so of the MPs that did not respond to LACS to vote the other way for the Hunting Act to be overturned.

In the end, however, LACS may not need to worry. Because the likelihood of David Cameron following up his pre-election pledge to give MPs a free vote on the issue must be in doubt. A vote on hunting could well be one of a number of manifesto proposals that fall by the wayside in the new coalition.

That is a shame. The Hunting Act has failed to settle the issue of hunting to anyone's real satisfaction. Any opportunity to examine again the legislation and re-draft it would benefit the rural communities most closely affected by this law. A return to the status quo and unregulated hunting is probably not an option but sensible measures that iron out the anomalies and allow a return to humane hunting would be worth putting to a vote of the new Parliament.

Mr Cameron – for all his natural affinity for country sports – might not much mind, however, that the fragility of coalition government makes it easier for him to kick that particular promise into the very long grass.

There are many disadvantages, politically, for both the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats in this new arrangement. But one of the few plusses, at least so far as the party leaders are concerned, is the opportunity both sides will get to bury their most troublesome policies in what they can claim is the interests of maintaining a workable coalition government in the national interest.

How long did it take Mr Cameron to drop his controversial policies on raising the inheritance tax threshold, for example? And while he expressed regret, what's the betting he was not too sorry to have to ditch a policy that saw him accused of pandering to multi-millionaires. So far we have heard little from him on hunting. But if he were to say that because of the views of his Lib Dem colleagues and the pressing nature of other issues the free vote would be delayed indefinitely we would not be surprised.