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ALL CREDIT to any MP not afraid of being laughed at. Step forward Lembit
Opik, Liberal Democrat MP for Montgomeryshire, whose famous grandfather Ernst
pioneered the study of comets back in the 1930s.

Opik secured an end-of-day adjournment debate on potentially hazardous
near-Earth objects (NEOs) in March 1999. Unlike many similar debates, it
achieved a result. Not only did the government set up a task force on
potentially hazardous NEOs—the task force delivered a report in September
last year. Now the government has published its response
(www.nearearthobjects.co.uk).

The NEO task force recommended the government seek partners, preferably in
Europe, to build an advanced new 3-metre telescope in the southern hemisphere
dedicated to working on NEOs. Last month Martin Rees, the Astronomer Royal, came
to talk to the All-party Astronomy and Space Environment Group about the
prospect of a such a telescope. It would enable Britain’s astronomers to survey
substantially smaller objects than those now systematically observed by other
telescopes.

Rees has campaigned for such a telescope for a decade. In November 2000 the
Trade and Industry Secretary Stephen Byers announced Britain’s intention to join
the European Southern Observatory, which already has telescopes in the southern
hemisphere. ESO has suggested that Britain could use a 3-metre telescope at its
observing site in Chile. This would be either a new telescope or a modification
of one of its 2.4-metre existing ones.

The Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council has offered to look into
the cost of setting up the telescope. I hear that the council is considering
making the project a priority for funding. Quite right, too. Mir has renewed
astronomer’s interest in NEOs.

GOVERNMENT departments can be very good at dealing with problems that fall
wholly within their remit, but less effective when faced with issues that
involve a mosaic of departments. Animal testing is just such an issue. It
involves the Departments of Health, Trade and Industry and the Home Office for
starters—and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the
Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions are sometimes drawn
into the picture as well.

Junior Home Office minister Mike O’Brien recently set out the government’s
position on animal testing. He told MPs that it fully accepts that scientific
research, development of new medical and veterinary drugs, and consumer and
environmental safety all depend on the use of animals. However, Britain is
committed to using animals only where it is justified and where there are no
alternatives. The government works with the scientific community, industry and
responsible animal welfare organisations to ensure this and see that the costs
and benefits of using animals in scientific research are fully explained.

Bodies involved in awarding grants, such as the Biotechnology and Biological
Sciences Research Council, the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust
are all brought into the equation, said O’Brien. So too are the Regulatory
Toxicology Group, the Health and Safety Executive and the Department of Trade
and Industry. This has led to new regulatory toxicological guidelines that are
due to be published soon.

The government has also set up a data-sharing working group in the hope that
industry will cooperate and share its data, especially on safety testing, so
that tests on animals are not needlessly repeated. In the same spirit, an
agreement has been drawn up to help government departments reduce repetition of
tests.

I’d like to think that such duplication will eventually be eliminated.