Animal Testing

Debate between Peter Swallow and Irene Campbell

Monday 27th April 2026 Westminster Hall

[Irene Campbell]

I agree with everything my hon. Friend said, and I will say more about that.

[Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point. A conflict is sometimes presented between our understandable concerns about animal welfare and good science, but, as she set out, there is no such conflict. The really heartbreaking, frustrating thing is that many of the ongoing experiments that cause animals to suffer are far less rigorous than some of the alternatives that we already know work better but are not yet regulated in the same way. Does she agree that the Government’s road map fires the starting gun to make sure we have regulated alternatives in place as quickly as possible? Will she join me in urging the Government to move as quickly as possible so we can get better, more robust science and protect animals? It is an “and”, not an “or” or an “either”.

[Irene Campbell]

I agree with everything my hon. Friend said. I will speak about some of this later on, but I have on occasion met the relevant Minister and we are due to have a meeting soon. At one meeting, I asked specifically that we remove dogs immediately from medical testing. I was very disappointed by the answer, but we need to keep up the momentum on these serious issues.

There are alternatives to animal research—known as new approach methodologies, or NAMs—that are constantly being researched and developed. For example, any Members here who attended last year’s Lush Cosmetics event would have seen their soaps depicting organ-on-a-chip technology; they are plastic chips that can mimic human organ and tissues for experimentation.

AI is another great and exciting opportunity for replacing animal testing. A software called AnimalGAN, developed by the US Food and Drug Administration, aims to accurately determine how rats would react to chemicals without the need to do new rat tests.

Scientific and Regulatory Procedures: Use of Dogs

Debate between Peter Swallow and Irene Campbell

Monday 28th April 2025 Westminster Hall

[Irene Campbell]

I agree with everything that my hon. Friend said. Animal Research UK continued:

“Applicants are allowed to adjust and re-submit licence applications to enable them to be granted (for the last four years applications had a mean number of 2.55 iterations before they were granted).”

The Animals in Science Regulation Unit’s 2023 annual report stated that there were 169 cases of non-compliance with the law or licence conditions—only a 3% decrease from 2022. Those cases involved a total of 154,904 animals, representing an overwhelming 864% increase on 2022.

Beagles were used in a study conducted by AstraZeneca to test a new, more eco-friendly propellant for use in inhalers. The tests lasted up to 39 weeks and involved 72 beagles. The dogs were restrained by a tether and forced to inhale the gas for two hours each day through a mask fitted over their nose and mouth, which was held in place by a muzzle. Although the study states that the dogs had freely available access to water, it also states that water was withheld during the tests and for 16 hours overnight. That meant that the dogs went without water for at least 18 hours each day. At the end of the study, all the dogs were killed so that their tissues could be dissected for further study. The authors noted that the inhalers contribute only a small fraction of global hydrofluoroalkane emissions, so was that treatment of the dogs really justified?

In 2017, the Home Office released figures showing the 1.81 million additional animals were bred but not used for scientific procedures in Britain, but we had no additional data since then. Those 1.81 million animals included 97 beagles, but we have no idea what happened to those that were not used.

[Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)]

We are a nation of dog lovers and animal lovers. Does my hon. Friend agree that there is widespread public support for setting out a road map for ending the use of animal testing, so that the very sad stories that she is describing can be left in the history books, where they belong?

[Irene Campbell]

I fully agree, and I will speak a little about that later.

Modern, non-animal methods give the best possible chance of securing medical progress, since they are not hampered by translating from one species to another. An estimated 92% of drugs fail in human clinical trials, even though they had passed pre-clinical tests, including animal tests. Just over 30% of those that pass are subsequently re-labelled with warnings of side effects not predicted by animal tests, and almost 10% are completely withdrawn from the market.

New non-animal methods, based directly on human biology, include the use of computer modelling and organ-on-a-chip technology, which can be much more relevant to the human body. I went on lab trip recently with the APPG on phasing out animal experiments in medical research to visit the Animal Replacement Centre of Excellence at Queen Mary University of London, and I saw in person the pioneering work that is being done to provide medical breakthroughs without the use of animals.