OPEN GOVERNMENT AND ANIMAL EXPERIMENTS

That this House is concerned that the current lack of accountability and openness created by the secrecy clause, Section 24 of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, is a hindrance to public accountability, open government and the replacement, reduction and refinement of animal use in experiments; notes the concerns of the animal experimentation industry about personal information and intellectual property, which are already met by the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and are no reason to maintain a blanket ban on information, especially as government polls reveal a decreasing level of public trust in regulation; and calls on the Government to repeal Section 24 of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986.