Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1340-1359)
RT HON
ALISTAIR DARLING
MP, PROFESSOR SIR
DAVID KING
AND SIR
BRIAN BENDER
KCB
5 JULY 2006
Q1340 Chairman: Specifically, you,
Alistair?
Mr Darling: At the end of the
day, the buck stops with the secretary of state, it is the secretary
of state's job to make the judgment and to make the decision.
What has changed, as I said earlier, is that I think secretaries
of state now are far more exposed to the advice of their Chief
Scientific Advisers than ever they were in the past, and secretaries
of state also are very much more mindful of some of the longer-term
issues that they have got to face. I do not think it is a question
of trying to set up scientific advisers against ministers, and,
as in all policy-making, the process often is very collaborative
and very often you come to the same conclusion. It may be that
from time to time David, for example, may feel that the Government
should have gone further, or that the tender has gone further
than it should have done, based on his advice, but that is the
way the system operates.
Professor Sir David King: My feeling
is, Brian, that phrase is unacceptable, `on tap but not on top',
for the following reason. It has been my objective, in this post
in Government, to take science out of the box, and the way to
do this is to demonstrate that science impacts in areas where
people did not expect it to impact. The phrase `on tap' implies
that the minister, knows exactly when to turn to the scientist,
turn it on and turn it off again, and I disagree with that completely.
I think that is why the scientist needs to have a direct reporting
line to the secretary of state, that is why the scientist needs
to be on the Board, so that during a discussion where the others
think that science is not relevant it is for that scientist then
to speak up and give the scientific case for it. I can give you
many examples where I think people have been quite sure that science
was not involved. For example, I was asked once "What about
pensions; what has science got to say about pensions?" Here
is a thing where demography clearly has an enormous role to play.
`On tap' is the phrase I dislike, it is not the `on top'. Of course
the minister is on top but I do not think the scientist is `on
tap'.
Q1341 Chairman: Can I interject with
just one brief question on that. Do you think it is better, therefore,
to have a chief scientific adviser who is an external appointment,
who is able to challenge thinking, rather than having somebody
who is a career civil servant within the department?
Professor Sir David King: All
of the chief scientific advisers who have been appointed over
the period since we began five and a half years ago have been
brought in from outside, for the reason that I think underlies
your question.
Sir Brian Bender: Can I add, from
my own experience, I would not rule out an internal appointment
but there are not only the benefits that you describe but also
the benefit of someone who actually is fresh, so to speak, from
the research bench. Indeed, having someone like David, or in my
last department Howard Dalton, who actually spends a day a week,
usually probably a Sunday rather than the Friday that they are
allocated, back dealing with live research with students helps
keep them fresh. I remember Frank Kelly saying to me that he got
a lot of benefit, if the Secretary of State will not mind me saying
this, taking his problems back to the Clare College common room
and actually discussing them. I think having that external environment
as well as the semi-independence it can bring is very valuable.
Q1342 Dr Iddon: Let me challenge
you on what you have said then, David. As part of this advice
inquiry, if I may call it that, we have chosen three cameo studies:
identity cards, the ABC classification of drugs and magnetic resonance
imaging. Of those studies, ID cards, to me, probably was the worst.
We have discovered that the scientists have not been as engaged
as you, as the Chief Scientific Adviser to the Government, might
have expected them to be. Does that surprise you?
Professor Sir David King: Brian,
it simply comes back to the point I was making originally. I am
talking about where we should be, I think that is where we are
moving towards, but of course it is going to continue, my successors
will still be playing towards the ideal on this situation. I think
you have got some examples where the science advice has not been
brought into play, and that is precisely my point.
Q1343 Dr Iddon: That perhaps underlies
another of the views that you have given on a previous occasion
to this Committee, that the specialist skills of scientists are
usually hidden by themselves, because they see it as an impediment
to progression within the Civil Service. Do you remember saying
that to us, or words to that effect?
Professor Sir David King: What
I was talking about there was, you had asked me about the old
scientific Civil Service and I felt that the reason why the scientists
themselves did not like that was because they felt there was a
glass ceiling to promotion into senior positions within the Civil
Service. I think that is a very different issue, actually. Sir
Brian is an example of a scientist who has risen to the top.
Q1344 Dr Iddon: Do you think scientists
have a credibility in the Civil Service equal to that of economists
and lawyers and social scientists, or do you think we are not
quite there yet, your usual expression?
Professor Sir David King: I think
it is a very mixed answer. I think, in some instances, I would
be able to point to people, and I think, in a way, I am back to
where the Secretary of State was much earlier on in this discussion,
it depends on the individual, the individual who shows the quality
and the status and the ability to deliver stands above, and that
is how status rises for those different professions. I believe
we are creating a situation where scientists are now standing
proud, in the way you are describing for economists and others.
Sir Brian Bender: Perhaps I can
make three points, in response. First of all, I have read, of
course, the Report this Committee published in June, which is
not a terribly happy story, and I think, in a way, that reinforces
one of the points that we were making earlier, that performance
is patchy. I could identify, I was just jotting them down while
David was answering your earlier question, two or three examples
where I think policy has been based on very good scientific evidence.
For example, the work done between DTI and Defra in the last few
months in Europe on the REACH proposals on chemicals, the work
that again DTI and David, in particular, were involved in but
led from Defra on GM crops that Margaret Beckett announced in
March 2004, plainly the work on climate change. So there are some
areas where scientific evidence is really being used very well,
asked for in the right way, being used effectively, and other
areas where we are not getting it right enough yet.
Q1345 Chairman: Can you give any
examples of that?
Sir Brian Bender: You said it
yourself in your own Report on the HSE, I cannot remember what
it was called, the MRI issue where clearly it was not based on
the evidence; you have drawn the conclusion, and I would not for
a moment question that, that the evidence was not used properly,
or at least effectively, in the negotiation in Brussels. That
is the first point. I think the second point I want to make is,
as you will know from this inquiry, the Government, Andrew Turnbull,
as Head of the Civil Service, and Gus O'Donnell carrying it on
since, has been pursuing a programme called Professional Skills
for Government, which is intended to ensure that we all actually
have the range of experience and skills necessary. I actually
got to where I did, to the top of the Civil Service, without any
hands-on experience of operational delivery, which probably should
not have happened. The civil servants of the future should be
getting that experience along the way, and one of the key and
core skills, as it is described, for a policy-maker, so not a
scientist but a policy-maker, is evidence and use of analysis.
So getting this dialogue right between the analyst, in this case
a scientist, and the policy-maker is hugely important and there
is absolutely no reason why a scientist should not, so to speak,
cross the divide and become a senior policy-maker, and there are
examples of where that has happened. The reasoning behind your
questioning shows that we are still on a journey, we have got
a way to go, but I do believe we have got some of the actions
in place to try to get the right position at the end.
Q1346 Dr Iddon: We privatised the
Laboratory of the Government Chemist some years ago, and we seem
to be going along that path for the Forensic Science Service,
all very important collections of scientists working closely to
Government in the past. Do you think it is deleterious that we
are parting with some of our best scientists in this way and creating
a huge gulf between those scientists in their new role and the
old role that they would have had previously in the Civil Service?
Mr Darling: No, I do not think
so. They may be employed by different people and they may be going
on to different things, but the decision in relation to whether
it is the Forensic Science Service or anything else has to be
taken on its merits, whether Government thinks it is the right
thing to do or not. I do not follow the argument that in order
to get good scientific advice you have got to employ them directly;
in fact, a lot of the scientific advice we get, from universities,
for example, there is no direct employment, truly funded, substantially.
I do not follow your line of argument there.
Q1347 Dr Iddon: Do you agree with
that, Sir David?
Professor Sir David King: I think
there have been very clear advantages. You mentioned the LGC and
I have been around the LGC, I am very impressed with the way they
have developed as a privatised organisation. They are taking work
from the rest of Europe, other European governments are now sending
work to the LGC, so I think it is an example of a very successful
privatisation. I think what you are referring to, Brian, is the
fact that the LGC potentially would have senior scientists who
would bubble up into the Civil Service system and end up as permanent
secretaries, and they have been taken out of the system by that
mechanism. QinetiQ would be another example of that, a very good
example. I think what we need to do, acknowledging the advantages
of that process, is to see that we do maintain scientific strength
and capacity within government departments, and that is certainly
what I am trying to do. It has the advantage that we have now
begun to parachute people in from outside, and earlier the Secretary
of State said to me that Frank Kelly was like having a breath
of fresh air in the Department, it has that advantage, and you
might not have got in the past. I think, as long as we address
the problems arising from that then we can manage.
Q1348 Dr Iddon: This is for Alistair
really. There is a Government Social Research Service, a Government
Economic Service, a Government Statistical Service, a Government
Operational Research Service, but there is not an equivalent for
the natural and physical sciences: why not?
Mr Darling: I do not know, is
the short answer to that. That is something I will look at. I
do not know, is the straightforward answer to it. If I can add
to what David said in the last question, I think actually you
raise a broader and more profound question for recruitment into
the Civil Service and, dare I say, in this company, if you look
at the composition of the House of Commons we are, on any view,
very, very light on people with scientific backgrounds, and I
think it shows. Not here, I hasten to add.
Chairman: That is a personal slur.
Q1349 Dr Iddon: Sir David, has that
question that I have just posed to the Secretary of State hit
you in the eye before? We have different government bodies that
are supporting social research, economic research, statistical
research, operational research, but not scientific research.
Professor Sir David King: I think
that what you have, for example, if you take operational researchers,
they are a very well-defined group of people, they have a mode
of operation that is very well defined. If you move over to where
I am operating from, it is a much broader range of activity, we
have got the applied mathematicians, the pure mathematicians,
on the one hand, we have got physical scientists, life scientists,
psychologists, you have got a much broader range of people within
that science community. Of course, as Head of Profession, head
of the science profession in Government, it is my job to see that
there is a proper professional development process in place for
those people we are now talking about as scientists, but we have
got to live with the fact that it is a much more heterogeneous
group of people, and therefore rather more challenging to corral
than the other groups that you have mentioned.
Q1350 Bob Spink: Perhaps you could
argue, conversely, and it is how you interpret the evidence, that
would be a reason for having a specific body, rather than a reason
for not having one, Sir David. Sir David, when will you be publishing
the revised Code of Practice for the Scientific Advisory Committees?
Professor Sir David King: We are
looking at it carefully at the moment and I do not think we will
be ready to publish until 2007.
Q1351 Bob Spink: Can you take us
through where the major changes will be?
Professor Sir David King: No.
Q1352 Bob Spink: Will you have a
strategy for securing compliance with this new Code; what will
that be?
Professor Sir David King: I have
currently a strategy in place and that strategy is the Chief Scientific
Adviser's Committee, which operates down through the departments,
and then the science reviews, the Science and Innovation Strategy,
so the Chief Scientific Adviser's Guidelines, which have been
updated more recently, and the Code of Practice are absolutely
key to the implementation of what we are trying to do.
Q1353 Bob Spink: How do you make
sure, Sir David, that the independent advisory committees remain
independent?
Professor Sir David King: The
Code of Practice currently in place assures that, through the
mechanism by which the membership is drawn together.
Q1354 Bob Spink: What role does the
CSA have to play in that process?
Professor Sir David King: The
chief scientific adviser in the government department has to see
that the Code is followed in pulling together the committees,
so I would not say just the chief scientific advisers, it is the
civil servants in that department as well.
Sir Brian Bender: If I can add,
I cannot remember what committees it related to, but in my last
appointment I did ask Howard Dalton to reassure himself and me
that one or two committees were meeting satisfactory criteria,
because some doubts had been raised, either in the press or somewhere
else, so I did see it as a role of the departmental Chief Scientific
Adviser to provide that assurance.
Q1355 Bob Spink: Do you see the CSAs
having a role in monitoring the balance of the advisory committees,
that is, for instance, between lay members and experts?
Professor Sir David King: Yes.
That is part of the Code of Conduct.
Q1356 Bob Spink: Looking at this
question of lay versus expert, there have been some questions
raised on that. If I could just quote you the Royal Society, they
said there was cause for concern about a low level of scientific
representation on Defra's committee for radioactive waste management,
and Professor Grimston said, quite eloquently actually: "Increasingly
committees examining complex scientific issues are being populated
by lay members," and here is the eloquence bit, he said:
"elevating public opinion over professional expertise and
subordinating science to prejudice." What comment would you
make about that, and do you agree?
Professor Sir David King: That
would not be following the Code, if that were the result.
Q1357 Bob Spink: Would that be the
case in, for instance, the radioactive waste management committee,
or the ACMD, or any of the other committees; can you think of
any committees where that would be the case?
Sir Brian Bender: My recollection
is that it was indeed around that time, that, now you have raised
it, it was one of the committees I asked Howard to look at. The
Royal Society were saying this, and he engaged in some discussion
with the Royal Society, with the Chair, and certainly did provide
some advice to ministers at the time.
Q1358 Dr Harris: Would you consider,
from your previous role at Defra, the Veterinary Products Committee
to be an independent scientific advisory committee?
Sir Brian Bender: I am afraid
I would need notice. I cannot remember its exact role and responsibility,
but I would assume it is listed somewhere in the Defra website
as either fitting that description or not.
Q1359 Dr Harris: I was not trying
to catch you out. The point is that in the Daily Mail just
recently it said: "Fears about eating beef from cattle pumped
up with growth hormones have been raised by a government expert."
I thought "What's Sir David been talking about now?"
It turns out that the man concerned, John Verrall, is the consumer
representative on the Veterinary Products Committee and yet a
number of newspapers have called him a `scientist' because he
has a scientific degree, or a `government expert'. I am just asking
do you see that as a problem?
Sir Brian Bender: Obviously, I
do not know the detail of this particular committee, but any advisory
committee will have a range of views. Indeed, I remember, when
I was in Defra, some of the issues around the Spongiform Advisory
Committee, its range of expertise, including the lay expertise,
and indeed the way in which it reached views and then some members
spoke outside the Committee, despite the views reached. These
things usually come down to the membership, and then essentially
the control the chair has in trying to ensure robust discussion
but then discipline when decisions are reached.
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