Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to page 14 of the Statistics of Scientific Procedures on Living Animals Great Britain 2017, published on 19 July 2018, for what reason there has been an 18 per cent increase in horse use since 2016.

The 2017 Annual Statistics show an increase in the number of scientific procedures involving horses from 8,948 procedures in 2016, to 10,600 procedures in 2017. This increase is accounted for by an increased collection of blood from those animals. Each blood collection is counted as a separate procedure and horses are used many times for this low severity procedure.

Blood products are used for a variety purposes, mainly human diagnostic tests. The increased number of procedures in 2017 reflects the increased demand for blood products by diagnostic and research laboratories. Over the same period there was a reduction in the number of new horses, used for the first time for this purpose, from 373 to 288.