Home Office Animals in Scientific Procedures Licensee Training

Legal requirements for working under ASPA

The Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 (ASPA) regulates procedures that may cause pain, suffering, distress or lasting harm that are carried out on protected animals for scientific or educational purposes. The regulation is carried out via a Home Office licensing system, for the person (personal licence), the project (project licence) and the place (establishment licence) (see Guidance on ASPA).

Under ASPA, you are not allowed to apply a regulated procedure to an animal unless you hold a personal licence authorising you to apply a procedure of a specified type to an animal of a specified species; and the procedure is applied as part of an authorised programme of work specified in a project licence.

About the Personal License (PIL) training

PIL A and PIL B training is the mandatory accredited required to apply for a Home Office Personal Licence (PIL) under ASPA. PIL C training is optional depending on requirements:

• PIL A (Minor Procedures): Covers basic biology, animal care, and the recognition of pain, suffering, or distress. It also includes module K (theory of humane killing).
• PIL B (Anaesthesia): Adds specialized training (anaesthesia for minor, non-invasive procedures lasting under 15 minutes).
• PIL C (Surgery): An optional, advanced track covering surgical principles, invasive procedures, and post-operative monitoring and any procedures requiring anaesthesia lasting over 15 minutes. 

Read about the modules and learning outcomes

How to get training 

At the University of Oxford, we provide add-on personal licence training for unusual species such as non-human primates, ferrets and hamster, Schedule 1 training, and PIL refresher training. 

Training for other species, and for project licence applicants, is provided through our affiliated providers, the Royal Veterinary college (RVC), Red Kite Veterinary Consultants Limited (Red Kite), and UCL.

Training taken at any other organisation that does not provide practical and handling as part of their course will require arrangement of this part by the delegate with another organiser that does as Oxford will no longer be offering practical and handling assessments for rodent PIL courses taken at other establishments. We will still be providing practical handling assessments for fish; this will be organised by us when you register for the fish course with UCL.

If you have any questions about training, please email training@bms.ox.ac.uk