President’s Newsletter: February 2026

Dear BTS Members,

I would first like to give you an update on our plans for the 2026 Annual Congress which will be held in Solihull from April 27th to 29th. You can find all the details, including the draft programme, on our website https://www.thebts.org/events/bts-annual-congress-2026/. I am pleased to report that we have had an excellent response to our call for abstracts, with 77 submissions made which will now be reviewed by the Scientific Subcommittee. Could I remind you that the early bird deadline for registrations is Friday March 27th and also that there has been no increase in the Congress fees for 2026.

The Annual Congress will also provide an excellent opportunity for members to explore their interest in two roles on the Scientific Subcommittee that we will be advertising soon. These are the co-leads of the Clinical & Human Toxicology speciality section (to work alongside existing lead Dr Mat van de Pette) and the Mechanistic & Discovery Toxicology speciality section (to work alongside existing lead Dr Nic Coltman by replacing Dr Francisco Inesta-Vaquera, who will be stepping down from the co-lead role in April). Please keep an eye out for the adverts and use the Annual Congress as an opportunity to discuss the roles with Mat, Nic and other members of the speciality sections.

You will also see on the website that on the afternoon of April 29th, the BTS and SETAC UK are hosting a joint workshop on ‘Science shaping regulation – Towards adoption of animal-free, exposure-driven approaches in UK chemical regulation’. The Officers and Executive Committee were delighted to support this new partnership between the two Societies, and we are looking forward to a good attendance at the workshop as well as welcoming those SETAC members who will also be registering for our Congress.

As I mentioned in my last newsletter, we were unsuccessful in our bid to host the 2029 EUROTOX meeting in Birmingham. We were competing with another very strong bid, from the Swiss Society of Toxicology, who will now be hosting the meeting in Basel. However, I am very pleased to report that the BTS Executive Committee fully supported a proposal to submit a bid for the 2030 EUROTOX meeting, again in Birmingham. We provided a letter of intent to EUROTOX in January and I am delighted to report that we have now been invited to present our bid to the EUROTOX Business Council meeting in September. I would once again like to thank the BTS team who have worked on this for the Society and also to acknowledge the great support we have had from the venue, the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham, and the local Business Tourism organisation, West Midlands Growth Company.

I also mentioned in my last newsletter the many members who have supported me so well during my time as President. At this year’s Annual General Meeting, which will be held on the first day of our Congress, we will be confirming the successors for some of the key roles in the Society, including the Vice President, as our current VP Professor Tim Gant will be taking over the Presidency from me, two Ordinary Members of the Executive Committee and the Vice Chair of the Scientific Subcommittee. It would be great to see more of our members attending the AGM; it’s an opportunity to hear about the work of the Society and importantly to also hear from you. It is just a one-hour meeting and will also be available online to ensure that members unable to join us at the Congress can take part.

You may have seen in the e-mails from our Nominations Subcommittee late last year that we are also seeking a successor to the role of General Secretary. Unfortunately, we didn’t receive any nominations, but I am delighted that Professor Shirley Price, our current General Secretary, has agreed to continue in the role for another year. I realise that many of you would be concerned about the time and experience needed to fulfil this role, but the Officers would like to hear from members who might be interested in shadowing Professor Price over the next year or so with a view to possibly taking on the General Secretary role in 2027. Please let us know if you are interested via this address: bts@execbs.com.

Finally, I should like to thank everyone who completed our recent EDI online survey. We are now in a position to analyse the responses and to communicate the outcome to the Executive Committee and then to all members at the AGM and on our website. I am once again grateful to our EDI Working Group, led by Professor Vicki Stone, who have agreed to conduct this analysis.

I look forward to seeing some of you at this year’s Congress but do feel free to reach out to me with any questions or concerns you may have about your Society using my usual e-mail address (president@thebts.org).

Kind regards,

Phil

Phil Botham

President BTS