Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to reduce the number of experiments carried out on animals each year; and if she will make it her policy to phase out the use of cats in scientific procedures.

Under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 (ASPA), cats (together with dogs, horses, and non-human primates) are specially protected species. This means that greater oversight is required of establishments holding these species and of projects using these species.

Government policy is to actively support and fund the development and dissemination of techniques that Replace, Reduce and Refine the use of animals in research (the 3Rs). This is achieved through funding UK Research and Investment who fund the National Centre for the 3Rs and fund further research through Innovate UK, the Medical Research Council and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council into the development of alternatives.