To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many laboratories (a) were licensed and (b) lost their licence to perform tests on animals in each of the last five years for which figures are available. (179493)

The information requested is set out in the following table.

Certificates of designation may be revoked for a variety of reasons, such as the closure of the establishment, and revocation is usually at the request of the certificate holder. Issues of non-compliance with the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, or their conditions of issue, were identified at two establishments prior to the return of their certificates for revocation since 2003.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what procedures her Department employs to ensure that licences to conduct scientific experiments on animals are only granted in circumstances where no viable alternative exists; and what steps it takes to ensure that licences are not granted unnecessarily to different scientists simultaneously. (180347)

Under section 5(5) of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, a project licence cannot be granted if the purpose of the programme could be achieved satisfactorily by the use of a reasonably practicable non-animal method. Applicants for project licences are, therefore, required to explain why animals have to be used and a key element of the assessment of licence applications by Home Office inspectors focuses on ensuring that the use of animals is essential. In considering this issue, inspectors have access to a wide range of expertise and sources of relevant information and fully explore potential alternative methods in discussion with applicants.

The avoidance of unnecessary duplication of animal use is another key consideration in the assessment of applications and all reasonable steps are taken to prevent it. However, the replication of experiments by more than one research group is not necessarily prohibited. The scientific method demands that research findings can be corroborated by the same or different research groups to establish the validity of the results.