Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to phase out (a) animal testing and (b) testing on beagles at (i) MBR Acres and (ii) other facilities.

This Government has made a commitment to the long-term goal of phasing out animal testing in science and research. An immediate ban is not presently feasible due to international regulatory requirements for the safety testing of chemicals and medicines. Such tests may include dogs as an appropriate model. The number of Beagles bred is largely determined by the forecast needs of the pharmaceutical industry for safe and effective medicines.

The Home Office assures that, in every research proposal, animals are replaced with non-animal alternatives wherever possible, the number of animals are reduced to the minimum necessary to achieve the result sought, and that, for those animals which must be used, procedures are refined as much as possible to minimise their suffering.

The National Centre for the 3Rs have a project to create a Virtual second species to assess potential toxicity before commencing clinical trials. This is a cutting-edge initiative to develop computational models that simulate dog biology, aiming to ultimately replace the use of dogs in drug safety testing. It brings together pharmaceutical companies and researchers to create more ethical, accurate, and efficient alternatives.

The Department for Science, Innovation & Technology (DSIT) is engaging with stakeholders to finalise a strategy to accelerate the development, validation and uptake of alternatives to animal testing which is scheduled for publication later this year.