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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential impact of restricting the use of antibiotics in treatments for animal welfare.

Antibiotics are an essential part of veterinary medicine. Failing to use antibiotics in animals which need them compromises animal health and welfare. The Government’s position is that we must reduce the unnecessary use of antibiotics in animals while making sure they can still be used when they are truly needed, to reduce antimicrobial resistance. In the UK, the use of antibiotics in food producing animals has reduced by 55% between 2014 and 2021, and in 2021 we recorded the lowest antibiotic use to date.