Pet owners will be told if their animals are killed on the roads under new regulations to be introduced following a campaign by Midland MPs.

Ministers agreed to ensure officials such as Highways Agency staff trace owners of dogs or, where possible, cats if they are killed in collisions with vehicles.

The move will help reduce the worry and uncertainty of desperate pet owners whose animals go missing, MPs said.

They told Ministers about constituents who had searched through piles of animal corpses to find their beloved pet dog.

One woman even arranged for a laboratory to test animal remains against DNA taken from a chewy toy, to determine whether the dead animal was in fact her pet.

Microchips, which must be embedded by law in dogs, will be used to identify the animals. Some cat owners also choose to microchip their pets, although this is not compulsory.

While the change will not require legislation it has become known as Harvey’s Law, after a dog which died on the M62 in the North West.

Speaking in the House of Commons, Birmingham MP John Hemming (Lib Dem Yardley) said he had owned a pet most of his life, but two had been run over close to his house.

He said: “We found them not very well or dead. However, it would have been much worse if we had not known what had happened.”

Black Country MP Margot James (Lab Stourbridge) said: “I lost a dog on the road when I was a child – a Great Dane called Max. I have never forgotten him, but at least we knew within 24 hours or less, which saved a lot of additional heartache.”

But MP Ian Austin warned that Highways Agency staff no longer checked dead dogs or cats for microchips in the West Midlands.

He said: “Checks have been completely phased out in the West Midlands. None of my constituents’ pets will be scanned in the event of such a tragedy, but checks are still taking place in other parts of the country such as Cornwall and Devon.”

Birmingham MP Richard Burden (Lab Northfield) told the Commons that his cat, Charlie, was the survivor of a road accident.

The MP said: “He made a full recovery, at least physically; he has been a lot more clingy since then.

“All of us who are pet owners know what it feels like when a pet is involved in a road incident or, worse, as we have heard in this debate, when a pet does not come home and we do not know what has happened to it.”

He added: “The public care deeply about pets and are concerned about their well-being. I understand that about nine million households in the UK own a dog, and the House certainly has a responsibility to be concerned for the well-being of all those dogs, as we do for animal welfare more generally.”

Transport Minister John Hayes told MPs the Government would require the Highways Agency to identify domestic animals found in any part of the country and inform the owners.

This would apply to dogs, and to cats if there was any way of identifying them, he said.

He told the Commons: “The atmosphere engendered by pets in any home and the mood they generate changes families and changes life. They teach us to regard what God made in a different way; they challenge our certainties; they oblige sensitivity in all but the most inane; and they soften all but the hardest of hearts.”

He added: “To paraphrase Dickens, what greater gift can there be than the love of a cat or dog?”