A West End actress is campaigning to change the law so motorists who run over cats are required to report it to the authorities.

Olivia Holland-Rose, 33, re-homed D’artagnan, also known as Dart, when he was nine months old, but he died just after his fourth birthday when he was run over.

Currently, people are required to tell the police if they drive into dogs, horses, cattle, pigs, goats, sheep, donkeys or mules – but not cats.

Ms Holland-Rose secured a Westminster Hall debate after a petition she launched was signed by 102,000 people.

A Department for Transport spokesperson said: “Having a law making it a requirement to report road accidents involving cats would be very difficult to enforce and we have reservations about the difference it would make to the behaviour of drivers, who are aware that they have run over a cat and do not report it.”