Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, for what reasons his officials commissioned research on dog electronic collars from an academic who had previously urged his Department to ban such collars.

The Government is satisfied that the processes for tendering and consideration of bids, relating to the research on electronic dog collars in 2007, were conducted in accordance with the rules on government procurement exercises. The Government is also satisfied that the resultant peer-reviewed Defra-commissioned research carried out between 2007 and 2010 (AW1402 and AW1402a) was robust and showed that the devices compromise the welfare of some dogs. Data from the research was published separately in two different reputable scientific journals, which required additional independent peer review exercises involving scrutiny from experts in the same field prior to publication. This gives the Government further confidence that the results can be considered robust.