The right to test: You can't go to a doctor without having a treatment that has been tested on animals

The latest protest is confirmation of a pattern that has been very effective over the past two years. The strategy of targeting establishments by legal demonstration, accompanied by terrorist acts, has led to the shutdown of around half the animal breeders and suppliers in this country.

The latest protest is confirmation of a pattern that has been very effective over the past two years. The strategy of targeting establishments by legal demonstration, accompanied by terrorist acts, has led to the shutdown of around half the animal breeders and suppliers in this country.

Huntingdon is being targeted because of a Channel 4 Despatches programme that showed unequivocal evidence of cruelty by two rogue technicians. This was condemned by the entire scientific community, the technicians were sacked, and Huntingdon was inspected and given a clean bill of health, but it had been labelled by the programme and given iconic status.

The whole point of toxicology is to find out if products including drugs and cleaning products and paints and so on will kill human beings; it's fundamentally important to human health but not pretty, and it's at the more vulnerable edge of animal testing in terms of the images it's possible to paint. If the protesters manage to eliminate Huntingdon, I think their next target will be a drugs company.

It's so important to state that all the medicines and medical treatments available in this country are tested on animals - every vaccine, painkiller, transfusion procedure, anaesthetic. You can't go to a doctor without having a treatment that has been tested on animals - you can't pick and choose.

This work has to be done; products can't be sold in this country unless they satisfy regulations which include tests on animals, and quite rightly so. If Huntingdon is driven out, then it will test elsewhere, and the drugs companies will go elsewhere too, I've no doubt. We will be buying medicines from other countries where perhaps products are tested less stringently - or where there are fewer controls on animal welfare.

On their way into and out of work, the staff at Huntingdon, including the administrators, secretaries and cleaners, will run the gauntlet of demonstrators, who will spit on their cars, kick their cars, and scream abuse at them. They may be followed to their homes, their cars may be firebombed, their windows may be smashed, they will certainly receive hate mail and they will live in fear of letter bombs. I have had six cars destroyed in my driveway, thousands of pounds of damage done to my home, two letterbombs, one of which was potentially lethal and packed with needles and high explosives, which was handled by my children. We have had razor blades in envelopes and death threats.

For me, this has gone on for 13 years, because I speak out on this issue and encourage public dialogue.

The public should be talking about whether they want testing on animals, but I find it hard to believe, if they knew the truth, that they would not. I'm liberal minded by nature, but I cannot see that there can be any circumstances in which the right to protest includes the right to intimidate people in their homes - because it then extends to their families, their children and neighbours. Giving up would be exactly what these people want. It is a parody of democracy when a small group of people can influence the way the public makes its decision on such an important issue.

The Government has to acknowledge that this is a major problem of civil disorder and terrorism. I'm a Labour Party member, I support this government, and I'm very grateful for its general attitude towards the importance of science. But what is needed here is leadership. So far there has been not a murmur of support from any cabinet minister, and what has made Tony Blair and Jack Straw speak out in the last few days is the notion that the pharmaceutical industry may be driven out of the country. It's very disappointing.

Colin Blakemore, Professor of Physiology at Oxford, was talking to Hester Lacey