“All vertebrates should be given the benefit of the doubt and assumed to be capable of suffering.”

Dr Penny Hawkins, senior scientific officer of the RSPCA

“Research shows that fish respond to painful stimuli in a manner that is not just a simple reflex.”

Dr. Temple Grandin, PhD, PAS

“To say that a fish cannot feel pain because it doesn’t have a neocortex is like saying it cannot breathe because it doesn’t have lungs.”

John Webster, Emeritus Professor of Animal Husbandry at the University of Bristol’s Department of Clinical Veterinary Science

“I have argued that there is as much evidence that fish feel pain and suffer as there is for birds and mammals – and more than there is for human neonates and preterm babies.”

Professor Victoria Braithwaite, professor of Fisheries and Biology, Pennsylvania State University