Three arrested in Defra protest

Animal rights protesters scaled the department’s head office building in Westminster.

Defra head office building (Steve Parsons/PA) (PA Archive)

Three people have been arrested after animal rights protesters scaled the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs head office building in London, police have said.

The Metropolitan Police said two women and a man have been held on suspicion of criminal damage and causing a public nuisance.

Earlier the road outside the building in Marsham Street, Westminster, which also houses the Home Office and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, was temporarily closed after two people were reported on the building.

The Animal Justice Project, which campaigns for an end to animal farming, said its members had carried out the protest to highlight the “catastrophic” impact of bird flu being spread through chicken sheds.