§ Mr. Burdenasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many holders of provisional licences for experimenting upon animals were granted a full licence in 1967 and in the past six months of 1968; and how many were interviewed by one of his Department's inspectors;
(2) whether the licence issued for experiments on animals records all the usages of animals that the holder is authorised to undertake or procedures he is allowed to perform;
(3) if he has now issued a code of practice for experiments on animals, as recommended by the Littlewood Committee;
(4) what steps he plans to take to require teaching or training establishments making experiments upon animals to provide a detailed scheme giving information about syllabus, procedures, staff and students' qualifications, and the maximum numbers and species of animals to be used;
(5) how many persons who have not shown proof of comptence were allowed to carry out surgical work without recovery on animals in 1967;
(6) in how many cases experimental surgery or surgical or non-surgical work likely to give rise to pain, lasting discomfort or incapacity to animals, have required prior approval by his Department of particulars of purpose, procedure, species and numbers, duly endorsed by sponsors, during 1967;
(7) in how many cases experimentation designed to induce stress upon animals have required prior approval by his Department of particulars of purpose, procedures, species and numbers, duly endorsed by sponsors in 1967;
(8) when he plans to issue an interim code of standards governing the care and accommodation of laboratory animals; and when he plans to make the necessary regulations;
(9) if he will give details of the examination made of applications by establishments intending to accommodate laboratory animals to ensure they are capable of complying with required standards before registration is issued;
264W(10) to what extent he requires applicants for registration of premises for the care and accommodation of laboratory animals to submit a scheme of management and a statement of the internal administration arrangements for overall supervision of animals;
(11) what arrangements he has made for veterinary advice to be available in all animal laboratories.
§ Mr. EnnalsThe new system of statutory control that these Questions envisage has not been set up, depending, as it does, on the implementation of the Departmental Committee's report.
§ Mr. Burdenasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many animals have been used for experimental purposes in 1965, 1966, 1967 and in the first six months of 1968.
§ Mr. EnnalsI have the number of experiments performed annually by persons licensed under the Cruelty to Animals Act, 1876, but not the number of animals used; 4,751,060 experiments were performed in 1965 and 4,615,023 in 1966; the figures for 1967 will be available shortly.