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Animal Procedures Committee:Annual Report 2004

My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Andy Burnham) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement. In accordance with Section 20(5) of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, I have placed the committee's annual report for 2004 in the Library today. Among other things the report includes; Changes agreed to the types of applications to be referred to the committee for advice; The Home Office's responses to some of the committee's completed reports—on the use of primates and on ““overbreeding””; Progress by several working groups taking forward work that the Home Office has commissioned, including on humane euthanasia techniques, statistics of the use of animals and suffering and severity; Progress on subjects that the committee has identified as deserving of study—on cephalopods; on lessons to be learnt from the BUAV allegations about primate use at Cambridge University and on the batch testing of botulinum toxin; Results of research projects funded by the Home Office on the committee's advice.