Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make it her Department's policy to ban animal testing where it causes animals severe suffering; and whether she is taking steps to promote New Approach Methodologies to replace animal testing.

The use of animals in science supports the development of new medicines and the safety of our environment, for the benefit of humans and animals.

The Home Office assures appropriate protection of the use of animals in science through licensing and compliance assurance under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986. This legal framework, implemented by the Home Office Regulator, requires that animals are only ever used in science where there are no alternatives, where the number of animals used is the minimum needed to achieve the scientific benefit, and where the potential harm to animals is limited to that needed to achieve the scientific benefit.

The Government actively supports and funds the development and dissemination of the 3Rs. This is achieved through funding UK Research and Investment who fund the National Centre for the 3Rs and research through Innovate UK, the Medical Research Council and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council into the development of alternatives.