ALTHOUGH I respect Peter and Pauline Broughton’s right to an opinion on animal research, I would suggest that they get their facts straight before forming it.

They claim that that “no government has yet commissioned an independent evaluation of the efficacy of animal research”, yet our own Government has conducted four, all of which found in favour of it. There have also been several investigations by the global scientific community.

The mention of Section 24 is similarly based on incomplete comprehension.

Scientists submit papers to scientific journals, which then print the details of the experiment. If they want more than an abstract then members of the public can visit the ‘pubmed’ website and insert any animal name they like for details of experiments.

Section 24, conceived as a protection both to commercial information and the violent attacks of animal groups, simply says that not any Tom, Dick or Harry is allowed access to an institution’s intellectual property.

Anti-vivisection groups often make a mint out of this sort of hype and are no doubt campaigning to have full access to research so they will have more to misrepresent, but I believe SPEAK to be different.

I believe them to be caring people, but they have been swayed by the untruths of the anti-vivisection movement that still campaigns against conditions that were outlawed 30 years ago. I would prefer that before they SPEAK, they LEARN.

JOY ROGERS, Junction Road, Oxford