Irene Campbell

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart. I thank the Minister for his response, although I am sure he is not surprised that I disagree with quite a bit of it. I hope the responsible Minister will consider implementing at pace—I use that word again, as many others have—the replacement methods we have heard so much about in this debate. I urge the responsible Minister to rescind the forced swim test licences immediately and to prioritise a review of the whole licensing system, because there are problems with that whole system. We must also have more robust enforcement of what is going on in laboratories. I accept that statements have been made that there is enforcement and that animals are being looked after in the way they should be, but we have heard examples today where that often is not the case. There is so much self-reporting, which begs the question: what is not reported? The petition addresses an issue I care deeply about, and it is clear from the attendance and excellent speeches today that it is important to many. It is a privilege to present such debates in Parliament. The United Kingdom is often referred to as a nation of animal lovers, and petitions such as this show how deeply the public care about animal welfare and the treatment of animals in laboratories. I thank Jarrod Bailey and Maria Iriart for meeting me on behalf of Camp Beagle, which launched this petition, and the many individuals, charities and organisations that I work with on this issue. I will name a few: Animal Aid, Animal Free Research UK, Cruelty Free International, PETA, Lush Cosmetics, the Labour Animal Welfare Society and the Conservative Animal Welfare Foundation. Everyone is working so hard to end animal testing. As ever, I thank Petitions Committee staff for all their help in organising this debate and meetings. I will end with the words of Camp Beagle: “Animal testing is outdated, unreliable and cruel.” Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered e-petition 736578 relating to animal testing.