Petition: Ban Rodenticides - Protect the Wild

Ban the Use of Rodenticides in the UK

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Dear Angela Eagle, Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

Rodenticides are used routinely by 'pest' controllers in the UK, including contractors for local authorities, water companies and landowners. These poisons, which include Second Generation Anticoagulant Rodenticides (SGARs) as well as cholecalciferol and bromethalin, are all designed to kill rodents slowly – over a period of several days. A recent review by the UK government found all anticoagulant rodenticides as well as cholecalciferol to be “markedly inhumane”. What's more, these poisons, which local councils in the UK spent in excess of £145m on between 2020 and 2025, are not even effective at dealing with rodent 'infestations'.

Protect the Wild sent Freedom of Information requests to 381 councils across the UK about their 'pest control' policies. Only a fraction of councils indicated that they use preventative measures to  tackle rodent populations. Local authorities are using poison as a first resort, in contravention of existing wildlife protection legislation.

Rats and mice are sentient animals, a fact that was recognised by the Animal Welfare (Sentience) Act 2022. The slow, agonising death inflicted by rodenticides, inducing fear, pain, seizures and death,likely constitutes an offence under the Animal Welfare Act 2006, which prohibits the causing of unnecessary suffering to animals who are under the control of an authority. 'Pest' controllers are already legally obliged to do better.

There is an alternative. Preventative solutions are not complicated. Proofing a building is straightforward; the results last for years, and it poses no threat whatsoever to non-target wildlife. Controlling waste reduces the food sources that draw rodents to buildings in the first place. Where rodents remain, a properly proofed building simply keeps them out.

Rodenticides don't just harm rats and mice. Non-target animals consume them, or rodents who have eaten them. These poisons cause the deaths of companion animals, birds of prey, squirrels, hedgehogs, badgers and foxes. The practice of sewer baiting by water companies leads to rodenticides being flushed into our seas and rivers too where they are consumed by otters, seabirds and other fish-eating predators.

This isn't just a problem in the UK. Many countries are moving towards stronger controls on rodenticide. Nations such as The Netherlands, Switzerland and state/provincial governments in the US and Canada have each responded to mounting evidence of wildlife contamination by significantly restricting or phasing out public access to SGARs. The Netherlands has also restricted the use of cholecalciferol.

It’s no surprise that there is a big profit motive at play in the sale and marketing of SGARs and other rodenticides. In fact, the global 'pest' control market was valued at $25.26 billion in 2024. The list of the main players manufacturing and selling SGARs includes some of the world’s biggest and most controversial pharmaceutical companies.

Despite all of this suffering and death, and all the money spent, rodenticides aren't even effective at carrying out the task they were intended for. Rats and mice have developed genetic resistance to SGARs, which are the most widely used poisons. The latest figures, published in a CRRU-commissioned report carried out by the government’s Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) and the University of Reading, show that between 2009 and 2023 77% of tail samples from rats and 94.8% from mice possessed DNA which had developed some genetic resistance to anticoagulant rodenticides.

The industry-led watchdog, the Campaign for Responsible Rodenticide Use (CRRU) recently wrote “the continued use of anticoagulants against rodent populations that are resistant to them has important adverse consequences”: namely that the human health problems connected to living in close proximity with rats weren't addressed; that genetic resistance to SGARs spreads further and that an increased number of non-target animals were killed.

Rodenticides are cruel, expensive and ineffective. I am calling on you to support UK legislation following in the footsteps of the Netherlands, Switzerland, California and British Columbia. The UK needs to take a bold step further, and enact a complete ban on all rodenticides.

In addition, the current protocols for sewer baiting are inadequate to prevent our seas and rivers from being polluted with rodenticide. The practice of sewer baiting needs to stop now.

I urge you to act on this without delay, I eagerly anticipate your response.

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Ban the Use of Rodenticides in the UK

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