[not sure what this means - but I should not that organic firms are becoming a major market force in the US - our cost for organics is dropping rapidly, to the point that you find them in every grocery store, including the chains - Will in Seattle] ----- forwarded message ----- Date: Sun, 27 Jan 2002 22:51:21 -0800 From: radtimes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Animal rights - Huntingdon quits LSE
Animal rights - Huntingdon quits LSE <http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/14253/story.htm> Story by Mark Potter REUTERS NEWS SERVICE UK: January 28, 2002 LONDON - The British government vowed on Thursday that no more firms would be hounded overseas as drugs testing laboratory Huntingdon Life Sciences quit the London stock market to the delight of animal rights activists. "We will not hesitate to take any further action to make sure that legitimate businesses are free to operate without fear of intimidation," a Home Office spokeswomen told Reuters. Shares in Britain's oldest animal laboratory left the London Stock Exchange on Thursday after a determined and sometimes violent campaign by protesters to cut off its funding. Huntingdon is switching its listing to the United States, where the law does more to protect shareholders. Animal activists took up the challenge, saying they would continue to target Huntingdon and its backers. "We will not stop until we have driven this disgusting firm out of business," Joseph Dawson, a campaigner at Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC), told Reuters. The laboratory outside Cambridge, in southern England, came to notoriety in 1997 when a television documentary exposed cruelty toward animals in its laboratories. Despite sweeping management changes since then and a clean bill of health from government inspectors, activists have kept up a campaign to close it down. Early last year, Huntingdon was driven to the brink of bankruptcy when Royal Bank of Scotland declined to extend a loan after threats to its directors. And earlier this month, the firm's latest backer - Stephen's Group Inc of the United States - said it was selling its stake to an unnamed investor after the anti-Huntingdon campaign reached its headquarters in Arkansas. "We'll find out who they are (the new backer), and we'll drive them away as well," SHAC's Dawson said. HUNTINGDON DEFIANT Despite these set-backs, Huntingdon denied it was on the run. "We've moved our listing to the U.S. to protect our shareholders," a spokesman told Reuters. Under U.S. law, companies are only obliged to publish the names of shareholders who own more than a five percent stake. In the UK, the names of all shareholders are publically available. Huntingdon said in October it was leaving the London Stock Exchange. Its shares are expected to start trading on Nasdaq's Over The Counter Bulletin Board in the next few days. The spokesman said Huntingdon's day-to-day operations would not be affected. Indeed, he said orders had risen around 35 percent over the past 12 months and the firm posted its first operating profit in five years during its third-quarter. "The biggest effect of the campaign has only really been on our share price, because investors feel intimidated," he said. Huntingdon's shares dropped from as high as 122 pence in March 1997 to as low as 3/4p earlier this year. They were cancelled from trading in London at 4-1/2p. FEAR OF CONTAGION While it is the UK's largest contract research organisation, the 70,000 or so animals Huntingdon tests each year represent only a fraction of the total used in scientific research in the UK. Most are used in the labs of big pharmaceuticals companies. "The real fear is that this sort of action (by animal rights activists) becomes more widespread," Aisling Burnand, deputy chief executive of the BioIndustry Association told Reuters. She called on the UK government to adopt U.S.-style regulation withholding the names of shareholders who own less than five percent of a company. Government legislation requires drugs to be tested on animals before they are given to humans. Some 2.7 million animals are used in scientific experiments in Britain each year, according to Home Office figures. About 85 percent are rats and mice, and about 0.4 percent cats and dogs. In recent years, the government has strengthened police powers to deal with protests outside people's houses, and introduced legislation for the addresses of company directors who feel under threat to be placed on a secure register. But it has a battle on its hands. Only last week, SHAC staged protests outside the houses of two directors of British bank Barclays Plc, which has indirect links with Huntingdon via Stephen's Group.
