As a nation of animal lovers it seemed serendipitous that the UK became the first country to ban animal testing in cosmetic products and ingredients in 1998.
However, it has recently come to light that the UK Government effectively abandoned this ban in 2019 and today a High Court Judge ruled that the ban can be reinstated, despite the Home Office arguing against it.
Is cosmetic animal testing legal in the UK?
Most people believe that animals are no longer tested on for cosmetics in the UK. In theory they should be right, as in 1998 the then-Labour government officially banned the testing of cosmetic products and ingredients on animals.
Unofficially, however, that hasn’t been the case since Brexit.
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What we know so far
In 2021, the Home Office insisted that the UK’s law on animal testing hadn’t changed.
August 2021: A letter from the Home Office to animal welfare charity Cruelty Free International (CFI) revealed that the Tory government once again allowed animal testing on ingredients exclusively used in cosmetics – a move that effectively overturned the cosmetics testing ban that has been in place for 25 years.
Officials revealed that our rules would be aligned with a decision by the European Chemicals Agency’s (ECHA) Board of Appeal, requiring certain ingredients to be tested on animals before they are used by humans.
The ECHA stated that Symrise, a German chemicals firm, should carry out animal tests on two ingredients – which are widely used across a range of beauty products – to satisfy chemicals regulations, overruling EU restrictions on animal testing of cosmetic ingredients.
“Under UK regulations to protect the environment and the safety of workers, animal testing can be permitted, where required by UK regulators, on single or multi-use ingredients. However, such testing can only be conducted where there are no non-animal alternatives,” a government spokesperson said.
At the time, Dr Katy Taylor, CFI’s director of science and regulatory affairs, said: “The government is saying that even ingredients used solely in cosmetics, and with a history of safe use, can be subjected to animal tests in the UK.