Home Office leak of sensitive documents

A sympathiser of the SPEAK campaign at the Home Office has leaked precise details of the application for the renewal of a project licence for research on primates by the professor who was recently investigated for cruelty to a monkey.

Every year, millions of animals in the UK are blinded, subjected to repeat electrical shocks, poisoned, contaminated with deadly diseases, disembowelled and starved by white-robed individuals called academics or scientists.

Greed, ambition, incompetence, vanity, cruelty and ignorance all play a part in the continued existence of vivisection. It seems that old habits die hard; even when their usefulness is being increasingly invalidated by those without vested interests, those without vision continue to cling to a science that should have no place in the allegedly enlightened 21st century.

In response to the growing trend of opposition, those practising and supporting vivisection are becoming more sophisticated in their defence of their truly barbaric activity. The language they use has become more refined and the supposed welfare procedures that protect the animals in the vivisection labs are becoming ever more stringent. Or so the vivisection industry and Government would like you to believe.

Take for example the documents that were leaked to us. Sections read like a responsible owner's manual on the care of primates; the language used has been carefully chosen and the monkeys would at first glance appear to be well cared for and treated with an element of compassion. Unfortunately the truth is somewhat different to the picture that the professor's detailed application attempts to paint.

Of course it must be borne in mind when reading such documents that those submitting an application are hardly going to tell the graphic truth about their intentions or how they will be treating the animals on which they will be vivisecting.

As recent evidence shows, the professor in question has absolutely no regard for the monkeys he is using, and letters we have received anonymously from within the University clearly detail the horrific suffering to which he subjected a primate. We are told that this was not an isolated incident. Working expressly against Home Office directives, the 60-years-plus professor is reputed to be a law unto himself, with numbers of animals lined up for him to continue his abusive practices should his licence be renewed. Despite having resisted a Home Office Inspector's and the University's own vet's recommendations to destroy the primate which he was under investigation for abusing, he seems nevertheless likely to be permitted to continue his work. It renders his licence application a mere charade, tantamount to a rubber-stamping exercise.

We can extrapolate some useful information from the documents whilst ignoring other details. For example section 18b page 1 states that a "new £18m housing facility for animals is under construction". Apart from the obvious fact that construction of the new facility ceased on July 13th when the contractors pulled out and has not yet resumed, other more important inconsistencies are highlighted. For example, one can read two things into this statement 1) the professor is lying to the Home Office as the University have now admitted that the new facility is to be a research facility, not a housing facility or 2) the statements made by the University stating that the new centre will only involve research on a tiny number of primates is a lie and that as SPEAK has maintained from the outset (and confirmed by information passed to us from a high level source within the University), large numbers of primates will be used at the new research centre.

Section 19b page 4, which details the length of the experiments to be performed, states: "the duration of the experiments is typically for up to 6-8 h daily and typically for up to 24 months". In light of recent comments by professors at Oxford, we can safely assume that the statement "the monkeys continue to be co-operative throughout this period" is a vast distortion of the truth.

The application is full of inconsistencies and any person with a basic knowledge of animal behaviour, particularly that of a wild-caught animal, will tell you the application is misleading at best and a downright lie at worst. Take for example section 18a, page 3, which states: "during the recording sessions the monkey works voluntarily to obtain rewards". Yet point 19b page 2 details the fact that "the monkey is 18h food and/or fluid deprived during the session". It is hardly surprising that the monkey co-operates, given that it has been starved of food and fluid for 18 hours! If by any chance it does not co-operate, then the document clearly states that the animal's punishment will be the administering of a solution containing salt (well-known to be an extremely effective and unpleasant emetic, and particularly if administered to an animal that has had no food or liquids for 18 hours). This gives a clear illustration of the careful use of language designed not just to mislead the casual reader but more importantly being seen to follow certain protocols that protect the Home Office licensors, who can - if necessary - fall back on procedures and protocols when their animal welfare standards are highlighted as being a sham as is the case on this occasion.

Under the heading "Recording sessions" in section 19b page 3, the professor continues with his censored account of the truth for the benefit of the Home Office licensors, who one must assume are either very gullible if they are taken in by it, or are part of the conspiracy which facilitates the continuation of vivisection. According to the professor: "the monkeys normally adopt a relaxed sitting position during the recording sessions", yet since he has previously stated in the application that sessions take anything from 6-8 hours, this is an improbability in an active, healthy animal, as any primatologist would agree, and would only be possible if the monkey's torso and head were restrained. Hardly relaxing... but "this attention to the comfort and welfare of the monkeys results in the monkeys becoming tame, quiet and co-operative." However on the previous page section 19b page 2 under the heading "Recording" in point 12 the professor contradicts himself, once again proving that the licence application is a pointless exercise as he states that the monkeys will be restrained by the head during the recording sessions.

In Section 19b page 4 under the heading "accommodation and husbandry" we can read about the professor's distorted perception of 'play-time' for his subjects. "The monkeys are provided with many environmental enrichments, such as play items", which, it transpires, are a rubber ball containing peanuts. Presumably this play item is removed for the 18 hours per diem during the starvation regime. In addition to a rubber ball, "the monkeys have a daily social interaction for several hours with humans." One can only surmise that this is when their human captors are experimenting on them - unless of course Oxford University employ full time staff to play with the animals. The answer to that is fairly obvious...

The professor goes onto say "a variety of foods and fruit juices are made available to the monkeys every day" - possibly, but only during the 6 - 8 hour window of opportunity as previously indicated in the document, since for the rest of the time they are starved.

The application for a licence is a catalogue of distortions and half-truths throughout, with a significantly damning inconsistency given what we know about the recent investigation into cruelty in the department. The professor states in section 19b page 4: "if a monkey becomes ill, as shown for example by loss of weight (...) and appropriate veterinary treatment was not rapidly effective, the monkey would be killed". We already know this is untrue. If the professor views his subject as an "asset", the monkeys in Oxford University are allowed to linger on in agony. Furthermore, even though he is flouting Home Office guidelines, the University will protect him, the police will protect him and the CPS will protect him. Should we hazard a guess at the Home Office's response to his licence application? An application, which if renewed by the way, will licence him to butcher, maim and torture animals in the name of progress for another 5 years, at the end of which period, he will be knocking 70.

The leaked document illustrates two points. Firstly that these licence applications are a charade, a ruse to placate the public into buying the lie that the UK has the strictest animal welfare procedures in the world, which protect the laboratory animal from suffering. Secondly, it illustrates that SPEAK and the animals have friends in high places, decent people who are appalled by the injustice of vivisection, and who are in privileged positions, privy to information that will help us continue to expose the true face of vivisection and those who practice it. All contractors or sub-contractors involved in the new laboratory build in South Parks Rd should be aware that they CANNOT remain anonymous, and that eventually they WILL be named and shamed. Roy Hattersley commented in a recent newspaper article that if those involved in vivisection truly believe in what they are doing - if they can TRULY convince us that there is no moral outrage in it - then they should not fear exposure. And so say all of us!

Those who put profit before compassion at whatever stage of this project must accept culpability. We will leave no stone unturned to expose them and they may rest assured we will.