Exposed: £4.5m on animal lab security
Security for Oxford’s controversial new animal testing centre will cost a massive £4.5 million over the course of the lab’s construction, The Oxford Student can reveal.
The release of the costs of security comes after former Oxford Student editor Roger Waite battled for two years to compel the University to divulge the costs under the Freedom of Information Act. The revelation regarding the cost of security provision increases the estimated £20 million cost of its construction by over 20%. The £4 million figure does not include security costs that the University will incur after the lab is completed and is equivalent to a year’s top-up fees of almost half an undergraduate intake. Animal rights activists have condemned the costs and pledged to continue the fight against the lab, even after its construction is completed. A spokesperson for the University said, “The University has supplied the figure of £4m, which is what is expected to be spent on security provision at the site of the biomedical research building up to its completion. We will not break this down further.” The spokesperson continued, “We are very careful about giving out any information on this project because of ongoing security concerns.
Oxford University is committed to ensuring that all those involved with this project can work and go about their lawful business without their security or safety being compromised.” In April of last year, The Oxford Student revealed that the University did not consult with Thames Valley Police at any stage during the planning process for the facility, in spite of government recommendations that they did so.
Officers within the force indicated that had they been consulted, they would have recommended building the facility, currently under construction on South Parks Road, in a less central location. This would have made it easier to police the area around the lab and might have reduced the massive security bill faced by the university. It is unclear how much money the government is putting into the project.
In 2005 Lord Sainsbury, then Under Secretary of State for Science and Innovation, said, “We will help Oxford with the extra costs that will inevitably come”. When asked what support the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) had given the University, a spokesperson for the DTI said, “For obvious security reasons, we cannot discuss details of any aspect of Government support or policing activity or the level of this support.
The spokesperson added, “The government is working closely with the University and Police to ensure that the project continues. The Government is committed to the Oxford University facil- ity being built. The facility will replace a range of existing accommodation across Oxford - improving welfare standards for animals and providing world-class facilities for groundbreaking medical research.
Preliminary work on the building started in late 2003, and since construction started in early 2004, animal rights campaign group Speak have held regular demonstrations at the site and in the city centre. In July 2005, the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) claimed responsibility for an arson attack on a boathouse shared by five colleges and then for the planting of an explosive device in the Corpus Christi sports pavilion two months later.
In November 2006, the ALF claimed responsibility for another arson attack, this time against the Queen’s College sports pavilion. Both Speak and the ALF have pledged to continue the fight against the lab, even after it has been completed. Mel Broughton, a spokesman for Speak, said, “I think it is a shameful waste of money - the health service and other areas of research are crying out for money. Even when the lab is finished we will continue to protest”.
OUSU President Alan Strickland said, “It’s difficult to put a ‘reasonable’ price on protecting staff and students, but it would concern me if the university has to bear the full £4.5m cost. The government cannot expect Oxford’s wider teaching and research to suffer in order to get this new facility up and running.” The government-backed project will centralise all the University’s animal research in one building.
26th Apr 2007