Contribution
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Ms Jardine. I thank the petitioners for securing this important debate, and the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Irene Campbell) for her excellent opening remarks. I am delighted to see so many Members from her party here to support her; I rise as a Member of an opposition party, but as a member of the APPG I fully support her position. I regret that apart from the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Huntingdon (Ben Obese-Jecty), there is no one from the Conservative party in the Chamber. I would not dare suggest that they are not dog lovers—perhaps they are out walking their dogs on this beautiful day.
My wife and I share our home with Lola, our beautiful cockapoo. I say share—I would not dare say that we owned her. We share our home. We just spent Easter ensuring that she did not make off with any of our chocolate Easter eggs; I know they are a guilty pleasure of the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran. Along with the 50% of families across these islands who have pets, I can readily see the contradiction in medical experimentation on dogs when so many of us understand the love, intelligence and friendship that our pet dogs bring to our lives—yet we seem content to inflict great suffering on them.
As the hon. Member for Horsham (John Milne) said, many comprehensive studies demonstrate that experiments on animals, including dogs, cannot accurately and fully predict whether new drugs will be safe for humans. As the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran said, statistics for 2023 tell us that 3,749 procedures were conducted on dogs in laboratories, 69% of which were to test the safety of products and devices for human medicine, human dentistry and veterinary medicine. However, as there is a huge question mark over the reliability of the tests and the human relevance of their outcomes, it is understandable that there is massive support for the banning of experimentation on dogs in the UK. In fact, not a month goes by where I so not receive emails on that topic in my inbox.
The Labour Government have confirmed that they aim to phase out animal testing and will publish proposals later this year, I believe, but they have not committed to an immediate ban on the use of dogs, which is what the petition calls for. I will be interested to hear what the Minister has to say. Some exciting—no, amazing—work in this field is happening in the UK, and it needs to be supported and celebrated.
As a member of the APPG on phasing out animal experiments in medical research, I recently visited Animal Free Research UK’s animal replacement centre of excellence at the Blizzard institute at Queen Mary University of London to learn more about its groundbreaking work into how cancer spreads using animal-free methods. Doctors showed us how they are revolutionising human skin testing, which is already providing better results for patients without using animals, as well as the development of animal-free next generation 3D tissues and disease models for use in biomedical research. In other words, they grow the tissue in the lab, and they do not need to use dogs.
Other truly transformative animal-free methods are available, for example, using computer modelling, which can provide results directly relevant to humans. Herbie’s law, as recommended by Animal Free Research UK, argues for a decade of change, and would mandate the replacement of animals in medical research in the UK by 2035, replacing them with humane, effective alternatives. There is support for that from within the Labour party, largely thanks to the hon. Member for Exeter (Steve Race) and his private Member’s Bill.
When the UK Government say that they are partnering with scientists, industry and civic society in working towards phasing out animal testing, I hope they will also consult with animal protection groups on that goal. The Government have also agreed to publish an alternative methods strategy to support phasing out animal testing, so I hope they will read up on Herbie’s law in that process, ahead of publication later this year.
If the Government’s goal, however, is to be at the forefront of an alternative methods revolution, bringing in a commitment to a ban on experiments on dogs would send a clear signal of intent and be a major milestone in the important phasing out of animal testing. That does not need to happen in 10 years—or even in five. This Government could commit to the full implementation of Herbie’s law by the end of this Parliament.