Animal welfare campaigners at Huntingdon breeding centre call for ban on testing on Beagles

• Watch a report by ITV Anglia's Rebecca Haworth

Protestors are calling for a beagle breeding site in Huntingdon, which rears dogs specifically for animal research, to be closed down.

A camp outside the MBR Acres site near RAF Wyton has been growing over the last few weeks.

They have been campaigning about the issue for over a year now.

The protests ramped up recently after footage emerged allegedly showing the kind of treatment that the animals experience at research laboratories. 

MBR says experiments don't happen at the centre as it is a breeder of research animals, regulated and routinely inspected by the Home Office.

However, it's not the conditions inside the facility are not the subject of the protest but rather the fact that the puppies are bred indoors.

Campaigners say the puppies never see daylight and are then taken away to be used for animal research, and they want this to stop.

Protestors argue that modern computer research could be used instead of experimenting on animals.

One of the alternatives, they say could include investing in technologies that will allow for testing on lab-grown organs and cells.

However, MBR says the animals are healthy, content and comfortable in a lab environment and that their work is vital for scientific breakthroughs.

The Statement went on: "What the animal care staff do here at MBR is breed beagles that are healthy, content and comfortable in a lab environment. We don’t conduct experiments ourselves. As a breeder of research animals, we are regulated and routinely inspected by the Home Office which upholds strict laws around building standards and animal welfare."

"We remain proud of what we do every day because our work allows the progress of medicine to save millions of human and animal lives," the statement ended.

The campaigners remain undeterred by these assurances and said they would stay camped outside the centre until it is shut down.