Contribution
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Twigg. I thank the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Irene Campbell) and the petitioners for securing the debate. Nearly 120,000 people from up and down the country have supported this petition and many of my constituents in Waveney Valley have taken the time to write to me about the debate. Such a level of public engagement reflects a clear and growing concern that the continued use of animals in testing is not ethically or scientifically justified.
Let us be clear about the scale of the issue. In 2024, more than 2.6 million scientific procedures involving living animals were carried out in the UK, with 2,646 using dogs; 82 using cats, 1,936 using monkeys, and 11,483 using horses. Behind those horrifying numbers are sentient beings subjected not to abstract procedures, but to confinement, physical invasion, distress and pain. Investigations by organisations such as Animals International and Animal Aid have documented those practices in stark detail. Footage emerging from UK laboratories lays bare a deeply troubling reality: animals immobilised in slings, straining against restraints or confined for months in barren cages while subjected to repeated invasive procedures. Dogs, overwhelmingly beagles, as we have heard, are routinely force-fed substances through tubes pushed down their throats or made to inhale chemicals via tightly strapped masks, while others endure surgically implanted catheters delivering infusions into the veins. Those are not short-lived interventions, but prolonged procedures, often involving twice-daily dosing for months, with consequences that can include vomiting, diarrhoea, seizures, internal bleeding, organ failure and paralysis. Yet the studies continue regardless.
Some animals are kept alive until they reach the brink of severe physiological collapse, or even heart failure, and even those that survive are invariably killed so that their organs can be dissected and examined. This is not incidental suffering. It is systemic, deliberate and embedded within the process itself.
The Green party has long been clear that we should reduce suffering for all animals, guided by the evidence. I am pleased by today’s strong cross-party support for that in welcoming what the Government have set out, but calling for the stronger ambition that we must see under Herbie’s law. The way we treat animals reflects our values as a society. We have a responsibility to recognise animals as sentient beings and reduce suffering whenever it occurs. However, this is not just an ethical question, but a scientific one. We are often told that animal testing is essential for human health, yet over 90% of drugs that appear safe and effective in animals never make it through to approval for human use. That extraordinarily high failure rate points to a system that is not only causing harm to animals, but failing to deliver for patients.
The evidence is clear: animals are not reliable proxies for human health, and differences in biology mean that results often do not translate. Substances that are harmless to us can be toxic to other species, and vice versa, meaning that outcomes can mislead in both directions. At the same time, the science is moving on. Non-animal methods, such as advanced cell models, organ-on-a-chip technologies or AI-driven approaches, are increasingly able to deliver results that are more accurate and more relevant to humans. Those are not distant possibilities; the methods are already being used and are improving quickly.
The UK should be leading on this issue. The Government have already accepted that there is no legal requirement to carry out animal testing and that regulators can approve medicines based on non-animal data, yet progress remains too slow. If we are serious about change, we need a proper plan to move away from animal testing altogether. That is why Herbie’s law matters. Named after a rescued beagle, it would set out a practical framework to phase out animal testing by 2025 while supporting researchers and industry to transition to modern alternatives. It is practical and achievable, and it already has strong support across Parliament and among the public.
The calls to suspend generic new licences, and to review existing ones, also merit serious consideration. Under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, experiments on animals are authorised through licences. Concerningly, those can take the form of broad five-year service licences granted to research organisations, and they can allow experiments to continue even when non-animal alternatives become available during the licence period. Furthermore, even though the law requires a harm-benefit analysis before animal use is approved, under those broad licences the specific substances to be used, and therefore the harm that the animals will face, are not always known at the point of approval. It is difficult to see how that meets a statutory duty.
This debate is not about being anti-science. Far from it: it is about recognising that better science is available. By shifting investment and policy support towards human-relevant methods, we can improve outcomes for patients while ending unnecessary suffering for animals. The petitioners are right: the system is failing both animals and humans. We have the evidence, we have the technology, and we have the public backing. What is missing is the pace of change, so I urge the Government to suspend all new generic service licences for toxicity testing immediately, to conduct a full review of every current licence held, and to deliver urgently on their promise to replace animals in science. That is the change that we and animals deserve.