Animals & Farming

RSPCA critical of Government over animal welfare directive

Your Expert Witness LabratA European Union Directive on the care and housing of animals used in scientific experiments must be passed into UK law by 1 January next year. Although the new regulations apply new welfare standards across the EU, many of the standards are below what is already in place in the UK, according to the RSPCA, which is concerned that an option to retain more stringent standards may not be taken up in its entirety.

On 27 March Parliament debated the Government’s proposals for passing the new directive into UK law, prompting the RSPCA to issue a statement.

“Many people, and welfare organisations like the RSPCA, have been deeply concerned that the government may choose to implement the Directive so that the UK law will be watered down in some critically important areas,” said the statement.

It quoted the deputy head of the RSPCA’s research animals department, animal welfare expert Dr Penny Hawkins. Dr Hawkins said: “We are pleased that the government has listened to the public and the RSPCA and maintained current standards in some areas; but these are just the easy options, and we are yet to be convinced on the bigger issues.

"We are still deeply worried that the local ethics committees at laboratories could be weakened and the roles of the Home Office Inspectors may be reduced. We will only be reassured that this government is genuinely concerned about animal welfare when it protects these critically important controls on animal use.”

The areas in which the RSPCA declared itself satisfied in terms of the retention of more stringent regulations included the continuing ban on inhumane killing methods permitted in the directive, the requirement for special justification for cats, dogs and horses to be used in experiments and the requirement for licences to carry out experiments on birds and reptiles during the last third of their incubation period: the directive would have only applied from the time of hatching, which is too late.

One area in which the RSPCA was not satisfied was that of housing standards. The statement said: “The RSPCA has also been campaigning for animal housing standards to be retained wherever these are higher in the UK law than the directive, but was deeply disappointed that the government did not make a firm commitment to maintain these.”

Dr Hawkins, who has appeared as a witness before Parliamentary committees dealing with animal welfare, continued: “Housing standards are already minimal – reducing these still further would be a clear case of unashamedly putting economics before animal welfare. This would completely undermine the statements the Minister made in the debate about the government’s commitment to providing the ‘best possible standards of animal welfare’.”