Examination of Witness (Questions 140
159)
5 FEBRUARY 2004
PROFESSOR SIR
DAVID KING
FRS
Q140 Mr Heyes: To the extent that you
have been able to reveal what the process is, then it does not
seem to me that it is particularly logical, formalised, written
down, cross-reference checked—the usual things that I, as
a social scientist, associate with a scientific approach to things.
It is all very subjective, is it not?
Professor Sir David King: I think
you are making a value judgment that I cannot see is correct in
terms of the outcomes. I understand the enormous problems associated
with what I have described as a storm in a teacup and I ought
to explain that. I do not think it was fair at all on the individuals
who are mentioned in that minute that the minute was published.
That is what I feel is grossly unfair. In terms of the process,
judge it by its outcome. Let's look at this list of people and
look currently at the United Kingdom and ask, "Is this a
fair listing of those in the area of science and technology who
have made significant contributions?" That is the judgment
I would wish you would make.
Q141 Chairman: You said earlier not just
that it was not fair that it was published but that it was not
fair at all that it should be written down.
Professor Sir David King: Yes.
Q142 Chairman: Which is rather different.
Professor Sir David King: The
two things, I think, yes. In the first instance, I am giving you
my view of the situation as regards animal rights, as regards
the Government's view on those laboratories and that work and
on the individual concerned. That is as much as I can say.
Chairman: Thank you very much.
Q143 Mr Hopkins: Setting aside my views
on the honours system as a whole, any system that is secret is
always going to be bedevilled by these kind of problems, is it
not? Even in a very open committee like this, the influence of
the Chair and the secretariat is considerable. In a secret system,
a list is sent away to we-know-not-where, blue pencil is put through
it—and long before it gets even to the prime minister's
office. People who are no-nos as far as the political structures
are concerned would not even get there. It saves the embarrassment
of the prime minister putting his line through them. Would it
not solve the problem if it was open and democratic?
Professor Sir David King: I think
that an open committee and democratic honours system would probably
be subject to much greater problems and I very much hope that
this committee is not going to recommend going down that route.
I think we would have populism leading to a much more curious
list that emerges. I would hope that the system would be judged
on outcomes; in other words: Is the list a fair list in terms
of honours? If not, then let's have a wholesale readjustment of
process. I believe the process should be transparent; in other
words, anyone who wants to know, should know how it works. But
I do think that there is a certain logic in not having the membership
of the committee known. It may be that the weight of your opinion—and
I would respect that—is that the membership should be known,
but I very much hope that the discussions will be in private,
so that people can express clear views without being concerned
that they are on camera.
Q144 Mr Hopkins: Democracy can come in
various forms and I was not suggesting a Pop Idol vote on television
or anything of that kind. It has to come through Parliament. But
does the whole system not militate against anyone who perhaps
has challenging views; does not like, for example, top-up fees
in universities and is known to favour raising taxes on the rich
to pay for free education for everyone? Someone like that, at
this moment, would have the blue pencil through their name, surely,
in your system, whereas in mine—
Professor Sir David King: I have
honestly—and I was asked that question before—never
seen evidence of that, at least on the list that has gone through
from the Office of Science and Technology. I have no evidence
of that. James Lovelock, Companion of Honour, came through our
listing. He is a fairly controversial character but Companion
of Honour is one of our highest honours.
Mr Hopkins: It would take occasional
exceptions to prove that it is not arranged, shall we say.
Chairman: Don't forget you are dealing
with politicians here!
Q145 Mr Hopkins: I have been in politics
for 40 years. I know what goes on. We know what goes on in this
place and this is relatively open compared with what you are talking
about. Would it not solve a lot of problems if the honours system
was taken completely out of the political realm and done by some
kind of citizenship committee, nothing go do with Downing Street,
nothing to do with the civil service, and actually made democratic
in that sense as well? So it would be open and completely outside
the political process.
Professor Sir David King: I come
from outside the political process; I am now in it, but I have
to say that I have a new respect for civil servants and I have
a new respect for politicians who I have come across in my new
role. And that is said genuinely. They are extremely hardworking
individuals and I have to say fair play is what the civil service
is about. If we now are discussing who should run the honours
system—should it be the civil service or should it be the
politicians?—I would say the civil service. They have a
tremendous tradition to defend and they are very keen to defend
it. With one exception, Chairman: I do think we must not muddle
the work of the civil servants in the honours system with the
political system. At the moment I do not see that muddling from
where I am; in other words, it is entirely civil service driven.
But I do worry about one part of that—and I just throw this
out for you—which is civil servants considering civil servants
for honours. I think they are very good and very impartial when
it comes to the entire community but perhaps it should be another
impartial group looking at civil servants for honours.
Q146 Chairman: They have a blind-spot
about themselves, do they?
Professor Sir David King: I am
not suggesting it is a blind-spot, I just feel it would look more
open.
Q147 Mr Hopkins: I am unstinting in my
admiration for the civil service. This committee has urged that
we have a Civil Service Bill, a Civil Service Act, to re-establish
it as an impartial servant of governments, whoever they might
be. Given that choice, the politicians or the civil service, I
would agree with you. On the other hand, I still think it ought
to be taken right out of the political system. My final question:
Is the whole system not about patronage and keeping people in
line and making sure that people do not rock the boat; about focusing
as much power in the centre as possible and not having diversity
of view, challenging views—the sort of thing I think is
healthy in a pluralistic democracy; about actually trying to make
sure they all pull in the same direction, with some kind of what
one might call establishment or government elite?
Professor Sir David King: I have
the same inclinations as you, so my concern would be that if the
honours system were to suppress individualism then I would be
very worried about how it operates. All I can comment on is the
operation within the science and technology area: I see no evidence
for that. I would be very, very worried if it occurred. Now, let
me put in a caveat. During the foot and mouth disease epidemic,
I was operating on a daily basis using a group of scientists outside
government in our university sector, scientists from Imperial
College London, Cambridge, Edinburgh and Oxford. They worked with
me from the moment I asked them to work with me. They dropped
everything and worked with me around the clock—sometimes
I was on the phone to them at midnight, three in the morning—and
this was a tremendous piece of good citizenship. So I am delighted
to say that those people were honoured through the honours system.
Do they appreciate the honours? Damn right they do. People really
do appreciate the honour that comes through. I had a letter that
arrived this morning from a professor who received an OBE. I take
the trouble to write to quite a few of these people. The reason
I write to them is because when I became a Fellow of the Royal
Society I was not quite sure what these three letters [FRS] were
going to do for me. I had always been slightly cynical. In fact
it gave me an extended birthday: I got these letters coming in
from people I had forgotten from my past. It was a wonderful week,
Chairman, of receiving all these marvellous letters of congratulations—it
is rather like reading your obituary before you pass away!—so
I write to people on this basis. This letter, which I received
this morning, says: "Thank you so much for your good wishes
and congratulations on the recent award to me of the OBE. I very
much appreciate this and have been grateful and humbled by such
thoughtfulness from so many colleagues and friends." People
appreciate it. This is a person getting an OBE, I have to stress,
a professor getting an OBE. It is considered a real mark of achievement
and people do appreciate it, and I do not think I detect in the
science and technology area any matter that would concern you,
Mr Hopkins.
Q148 Mr Hopkins: One quick question:
If that person got an OBE when somebody comparable who was more
politically acceptable got the knighthood, might that be a way
of just exercising a little bit of control as well? You know,
you give him an OBE, it keeps him happy, but he really should
have had a knighthood. Professor So-and-So in the next-door university,
doing exactly the same kind of work, who is equally worthy, got
the knighthood; he happens to be politically off message and therefore
he gets the OBE.
Professor Sir David King: I agree
with everything you have said except the "politically not
quite right". I am not aware that these lists in the science
and technology area have been distorted by this "politically
not quite right", unless you are referring to what I describe
as "good citizenship", but I do not mean belonging to
the right party or making the right noises by that. I mean actually
stepping outside your general career pattern and making contributions
to our society.
Mr Hopkins: Thank you.
Q149 Mr Prentice: Sir David, can I ask
you about your committee, the one you are prepared to talk about,
the initial sift committee. You said you were not getting a lot
of nominations in from the learned societies and the professions
and so on. Do you actually write to the learned societies and
the professions saying you want to receive nominations for honours,
"This is the criteria for a knighthood, OBE, MBE . . ."
and you file it off to them?
Professor Sir David King: The
precise answer to that question is that I do not do any writing
of that kind. I encourage chief executives of the research councils
to contact people in their learned society areas; in other words,
I sit above the process, if you like, and do not get involved
in a particular disciplinary area but they are covering each of
the areas[3].
Q150 Mr Prentice: Is there anything down
on paper? The chief executives of the research councils, would
they write out to try to spread the net to get people to nominate
or self-nominate?
Professor Sir David King: I am
sure the practice of different chief executives in response to
my concern that we were not getting enough good nominations was
different depending on the individual. They are more likely to
have picked up the phone than to have written a letter.
Q151 Mr Prentice: I just wondered if
it is formalised or whether it is just a very informal thing.
Professor Sir David King: Informal.
Q152 Mr Prentice: When you get the names
coming up to your committee, the sift committee, how do you go
about taking a decision? Do you vote? Or is it, kind of, by osmosis,
you just decide?
Professor Sir David King: Consensus.
I think, at least while I have been chairing that committee, we
have operated by consensus on all occasions.
Q153 Mr Prentice: So you could have one
individual, someone on your committee, blackballing someone just
by entering a reservation and because you always operate a consensus,
that is it.
Professor Sir David King: That
is an interesting interpretation of what I have said. No, absolutely
not. I am not aware of any occasion on which the word "blackballing"
would be appropriately used.
Q154 Mr Prentice: How much time do you
spend on each nomination? You have told us that you give the names
and the reasons to the permanent secretary of the DTI who forwards
the names and the reasons to the committee you cannot talk about,
the science and technology committee. How much time do you spend
on each nomination from your sift committee? Is it five minutes,
10 minutes, an hour?
Professor Sir David King: The
answer is yes to all those: five minutes, 10 minutes. I am not
sure we have ever spent an hour discussing an individual but some
names are considered rather more quickly than others.
Q155 Mr Prentice: Do you nod them through?
Professor Sir David King: No.
It would be more a question of sifting through in order to try
to see who are the front runners. Once we have some idea of agreement
on front runners, then we would have a much more detailed discussion.
If you take a look at the names I read out earlier on, you would
quite quickly pick out that there is a disciplinary distribution
there. One aspect of this is, because we cover physical sciences,
life sciences, medical sciences, social sciences, economic science—we
cover the whole gambit—we are actually in danger of comparing
apples with pears. That is probably the most difficult issue my
committee has.
Q156 Mr Prentice: Are you ever shocked
and surprised at a decision taken by the committee you cannot
talk about, the science and technology committee?
Professor Sir David King: Whose
membership I cannot talk about, yes.
Q157 Mr Prentice: Okay. If you have made
a recommendation and you have, kind of, star ratings, you will
put the names up to the permanent secretary of the DTI indicating
who you believe should get what, does the science and technology
committee ordinarily just go along with your recommendations?
Or are you, as I say, sometimes shocked and surprised that they
have not in some way? Are you with me?
Professor Sir David King: I think
it is fair to say that the science and technology committee does
a much bigger job than just rubber stamp what we have put forward.
We represent each of the disciplines. The next committee, as I
have tried to explain, is composed of a group of people who would
generally be respected for their science and technology standing
in the community of science and technologists. So the ordering
is likely to change. It is not a rubber-stamping.
Q158 Mr Prentice: Did Brian Cass's name
go through your sift committee?
Professor Sir David King: Brian
Cass's name probably came through the DTI. The Office of Science
and Technology list is science and technology that we are sifting
through. DTI would be looking at innovation, industry. It is a
different subset of people.
Q159 Mr Prentice: I see.
Professor Sir David King: And
Brian Cass's name would come through them.
3 Note by witness: However, officials in the
OST do canvas the Learned Societies, and internally, for each
round of the honours system. Back
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