ANIMAL PROCEDURES COMMITTEE (Hansard, 1 April 1987)

The Earl of Caithness

My right honourable friend has now appointed the Animal Procedures Committee under Section 19 of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, acting jointly with the Department of Health and Social Services for Northern Ireland under Section 29 of the Act. The new committee replaces the non-statutory advisory committee on animal experiments. We are most grateful to all who served on the advisory committee for the invaluable advice they have given to successive Home Secretaries, and to a number of its members for agreeing to joint the Animal Procedures Committee, which has been appointed as follows:

Professor D. G. T. Williams (Chairman), Rouse Ball Professor of English Law and President of Wolfson College, Cambridge.
Dr. Michael Balls, Reader in Medical Cell Biology, Nottingham University and Chairman of the Trustees of the Fund for the Replacement of Animals in Medical Experiments.
Mr. Edward Bernard, FIAT, Oxford Laboratory Animal Colonies, Bicester.
Mr. Jason Brice, Consultant Neurosurgeon.
Dr. Roger Brimblecombe, Vice President of Smith, Kline and French Laboratries.
Mr. Henry Carter, Veterinary Surgeon.
Dr. Charels Coid, Head of Division of Comparative Medicine, Clinical Research Centre, Northwick Park, Harrow.
Professor Anthony Dayan, Professor of Toxicology, St. Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College.
Professor Gordon Dunstan, formerly Professor of Moral Theology, King's College, London.
Mr. Roger Ewbank, Director of the Universities Federation for Animal Welfare.
Mr. T. G. Field-Fisher QC, Chairman of RSPCA Legal Committee.
Dr. Judith Hampson, formerly Animal Experimentation Officer of the RSPCA, now freelance Consultant.
Mr. Clive Hollands, Secretary to the Committee for the Reform of Animal Experimentation.
Sir Andrew Huxley OM FRS, Master of Trinity College, Cambridge.
Professor Sheila Jennett, Professor of Physiology, Glasgow University.
Dr. John Ledingham, Reader in Medicine, Oxford University.
Dr. Brian Newbould, Research Director of ICI Pharmaceuticals.
Professor Lawson Soulsby, Professor of Animal Pathology, Cambridge University and past-President of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons.
Professor Peter Venables, Professor of Psychology at York University.

It is intended to make one further appointment to the committee presently.

It is the committee's duty under the Act to advise my right honourable friend and the Department of Health and Social Services for Northern Ireland on such matters concerned with the Act and our functions under it as the committee may determine or as we may refer to it. The committee is required in its consideration of any matter to have regard both to the legitimate requirements of science and industry and to the protection of animals against avoidable suffering and unnecessary use in scientific procedures; and to make an annual report on its activities. We are required to lay the report before Parliament and, under Section 21 of the Act, to consult the committee before issuing or altering guidance on the operation of the Act and codes of practice on the care and use of animals. The advice of the committee will also be sought on all applications for licences for projects involving cosmetics, microsurgery, and the testing of tobacco products on conscious animals. We are very grateful to Professor Williams and all his colleagues for letting us have the benefit of their considerable expertise in the new committee which has a most important role to play in the rigorous system of controls established by the Act.