Volume 2

The impact of spending cuts on science and scientific research : sixth report of session 2009-10.

  • Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. Select Committee on Science and Technology.
Date:
2010
Catalogue details

Licence: Open Government Licence

Credit: The impact of spending cuts on science and scientific research : sixth report of session 2009-10. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    getting weaker and weaker. We have some very bright sparks, but it is not consistent, and that is a serious issue. In our hearings to the Lords Committee recently we heard from Anne Glover, who was telling us, of course, that this is a cyclical process and if science does not somehow trickle through into industry and come out the other end so it can be reinvested in the top, then we are going to have an issue, and at that is the issue that has arisen that we have to address. Q2 Chairman: Surely, in that case, we should be concentrating our resources on pulling through that science into industry rather than, in fact, further investment in fundamental science. Lord Broers: We have to be careful with that, because we must sustain our science base. What we do have to do is to find better mechanisms for involving industry. I think a lot of the fault has lain with industry, not necessarily with our university- based science. We have some industrial companies, Rolls Royce and BP, who know very well how to work with universities, perhaps British Aerospace, but across the board we are not particularly good and we are not particularly good at involving SMEs. Q3 Chairman: Professor Cox, the physics community, particularly the nuclear physicist academics, are bombarding us at the moment with, yet again, claims that that area of science, which, quite frankly, industry will not fund in the same way in terms of that element of fundamental science, is, in fact, again losing out. Can we not do without it for a few years? We are in a recession. Professor Cox: If you look at the amount we spend, first of all, on R&D in the UK, it is low by any international standards, even now. If you look at the league table, we are down below Iceland, Finland, Spain, Korea, Denmark, Portugal Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, and the Netherlands. We are down somewhere in between Luxembourg and Australia. Q4 Chairman: But they are small nations, are they not? Professor Cox: Italy, Japan, Norway, Sweden, Germany. We are low. Q5 Mr Boswell: Do you mean public spending when you say that? Professor Cox: Yes, public spend on R&D. It is also the same in private investment as well actually. We are low by all league tables. If you look at the STFC funding into universities, for example, particle physics is about £27/£28 million a year, if you discount the international subscriptions, astronomy is around £40 million a year. These are very small amounts of money, but as Lord Broers said, the people you educate who are the engines of innovation in the economy, it is well-known from any study that you look at that/you need PhD students and graduates educated in cutting-edge research institutions in order to take knowledge from wherever it comes, be it generated abroad or in this country, and translate that into innovation, translate it into economic growth. You cannot just switch off the R&D and the research in universities for a few years while you come through a recession, because when you come out of that recession you will not have the people educated at the cutting-edge who are the engines of innovation. Q6 Chairman: Professor Cox, there is an inbuilt assumption at the moment, both in Parliament and elsewhere, that because we have got this huge recession everybody needs to tighten their belts and nobody seems to be making the case strongly enough that we need to continue to invest and, indeed, invest more in terms of science, and Lord Broers is making the point, which I think is a very valid point, which, to be fair, he constantly makes, about this throughput, this continuum of pulling the stuff out of universities. My point to you is should we not be concentrating more on that side of things in this recession rather than in fact spending more on fundamental science? Professor Cox: The thing is, you need to know how to do that. I agree that if you could do it, then it would be a wonderful thing to do, but if you look at all the social science research that has been done by the Treasury, Salter and Martin, for example, in a very famous social science review commissioned by the Treasury, say that it is essentially impossible to identify the areas you would like to invest in to translate basic research into economic growth. Look at the example from America. Yesterday, I think it was, the plan for science and innovation was announced by the President. It says they are going to double to science budget over the next 10 years, and it says, “These investments will expand the frontiers of human knowledge and create the foundations for the jobs and industries of the future”, but, number ° one, it is accepted clearly in the Obama administration that the way to do it is to expand the frontiers of human knowledge and thereby we derive the benefits. Q7 Chairman: The Royal Society is the custodian of science, arguably, in the United Kingdom and is respected throughout the world. Do you accept that we should be spending more on science and that we should dismiss this idea of reducing and cutting back? Sir Peter Williams: In a word, Chairman, yes. Q8 Chairman: So what are you doing about it? Sir Peter Williams: Before I answer that question, can I give you an illustration, which I think goes to the heart of the matter, from purely personal experience. I spent 20 years running a university spin-out from Oxford, it was called Oxford Instruments. In 1911, that is nearly a century ago, a chap called Kamerlingh-Onnes discovered superconnectivity. In 1982, following Peter Mansfield’s Nobel Prize winning science for Nottingham University, we wheeled the first scanner magnet into the Hammersmith Hospital. It is still scanning patients today. Today they are a five billion dollar worldwide industry and we have also, much more importantly, brought nothing less than a