Text tabled : A7-0230/2010

  João Ferreira (GUE/NGL), in writing. – (PT) We believe that in this field, as in others, the establishment of common minimum levels of protection in legislation should not prevent a Member State from adopting more advanced and stricter measures of protection, if it so wishes. For this reason, we voted in favour of the proposed amendment on this matter. We believe that it is important to further develop techniques and methods which allow animal experimentation to be avoided, as we have stated in debate, but more is needed.

It is also important to disseminate such techniques and allow them to be taken up by most R&D institutions, including national scientific and technological systems with comparatively lower levels of development. Any legislative framework in this field must take this requirement into account, but we do not believe that the proposed changed can fully guarantee this. The European Union will have to play an important role in this field to promote cooperation between the scientific and technological institutions and systems in different countries, including third countries.