Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1
- 19)
TUESDAY 1 MAY 2007
PROFESSOR SIR
HOWARD DALTON,
MR TREVOR
GUYMER, DR
PHILIP NEWTON
AND DR
MIKE WEBB
Q1 Chairman: Good morning. Can I
welcome our witnesses to this the first session of the Science
and Technology Committee's new inquiry into Investigating the
Oceans. With us this morning are Professor Sir Howard Dalton,
the Chairman of the Plenary Committee for the Inter-Agency Committee
on Marine Science and Technology, Mr Trevor Guymer, the Secretary
of the Inter-Agency Committee on Marine Science and Technology,
Dr Phil Newton, who is the Deputy Director for Science and Innovation
at the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), and Dr Mike
Webb, the Marine Science and Innovation Manager for the Natural
Environment Research Council (NERC). Good morning, all of you.
Can I start with you, Professor Dalton, and say what is your assessment
at the moment in terms of the health of the marine science sector,
is it in good health, is it declining, is it increasing, what
is your assessment?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: It
has undergone quite a lot of change over the last few years, certainly
for the last four or five years. In some areas I think it is doing
quite well, in other areas I think it is not doing as well as
it ought.
Q2 Chairman: Can you be more precise?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I
think one area which has concerned us particularly on the IACMST
(which is a more convenient acronym for it than saying it at great
length) is very much to do with the co-ordination of the activities
that are going on within the UK. There is a fair amount of good
research and certainly there is a good amount of activity in the
area and, largely due to NERC, over the last few years, and their
programme, which I am sure you want to talk about, Oceans 2025,
it has made quite a big difference to the way in which we are
trying to get together to try to co-ordinate activities; but that
is only a small part of it. There is a lot more that needs to
be done in terms of bringing about much better co-ordination right
across the piece. I think particularly that is true, for example,
in government departments, where it is deferred to one or two
or three, many of which have a strong interest in marine science
and technology but which are not as well co-ordinated and functioning
as well as I think they ought. One of the problems we have is
possibly, in our particular case, that we do not have enough teeth,
in IACMST, to bring about many of the changes which I think need
to be brought about. We do not have resource, we act there in
just an advisory role; we are a catalyst, to try to bring people
together, and all that we can do is try to bring people together,
tell them what the problems are, tell them what the issues are
and rely very much upon them to try to sort it out. I think there
are a lot of issues which really we do need to address properly,
in terms of co-ordinating and developing the science, and in some
areas I think it is going very well, in other areas not so well.
Q3 Chairman: We knew that back in
the late 1980s, when this Committee moved from its predecessor;
has this been a constant pattern, and why do you think there is
this realisation now that we have got to do more?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I
do not think it is a realisation now, Phil. I think actually,
as you say, correctly, it has been with us for quite some time.
I just do not think there is the mechanism in place at the moment
to be able to address those sorts of issues. We are a very small
part of this operation. The IACMST is really a facilitator for
activity; we are not sufficiently geared up to being able to resource
any activities, we just do not have it. We have a very small resource,
funded largely by the Natural Environment Research Council and
by subscriptions from our members, but all we can do is point
people in the right direction. We are doing things ourselves,
we are initiating things and we are telling people largely what
they ought to be doing, but that is about all we can do.
Q4 Linda Gilroy: Are its powers and
membership appropriate to what you would like to see it do more
effectively?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I
think the membership is okay, there is no problem there, we have
all the right people on board; it is a question of how we can
get them to do things. All we can do is facilitate, all we can
do is indicate and bring people together.
Q5 Linda Gilroy: Where are its powers,
its remit, written out; is that a memorandum?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: There
are terms of reference. Trevor, who is the Secretary, probably
would tell you, better than I, what those terms of reference are.
Q6 Linda Gilroy: Are they appropriate
to what needs to be done to focus and energise what is going on
in the sector?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: Trevor,
maybe you can answer that one, because you know the terms of reference
better than I do.
Mr Guymer: Primarily, they are
to have oversight of what is going on in marine science and technology
in the UK within the international context and to ensure that
appropriate co-ordination exists. We have taken that a little
further, that when we have seen that we, IACMST, with albeit its
limited resources, could provide a useful co-ordination role ourselves
then we have taken that on, specific examples are marine monitoring
and to do with data and information management. We have set up
groups to bring together people from across the community and
when we have seen a particularly interesting topic we have set
up a short-life working group on that. One of those, for example,
was underwater sound and marine life, and that was very successful
in bringing together people from across the different sectors
who, perhaps, left to themselves, would have continued in parallel
tracks, but we have seen a real convergence there; but, with the
resources that we have and the remit we have, we cannot tell people
to do particular things. One useful thing which perhaps could
be done is to have added to our terms of reference that the member
departments and agencies should be required to report regularly
to the Committee. At the moment really it is much more on a voluntary
basis, people volunteer information; we try to encourage them
to work together.
Q7 Chairman: Dr Newton, can I ask
you this basic question, just to get us going: do you agree with
Professor Dalton's analysis of the state of marine science?
Dr Newton: I do agree with his
analysis of the state of marine science, yes. I think that definitely
there have been significant improvements in the last few years.
I agree also with his assessment of IACMST, and what we have done
in NERC is try to take some complementary approaches which would
be intended to deliver towards the same objectives as IACMST but
try to support it in some way, and part of that is the creation
of Oceans 2025.
Q8 Chairman: Dr Newton, can I come
on to funding. We want to ask you another question, Professor
Dalton. In terms of funding, do you feel that the funding for
marine science is adequate, is it getting better; is there a difficulty
with it, does that limit what you can do?
Dr Webb: To be honest, I find
it hard to be sure. Within NERC the marine sciences attract a
significant proportion of the funds available, so, in terms of
responsive mode, NERC is providing about 20 per cent of its funds
in this area. In terms of the strategic marine science programme,
Oceans 2025, NERC has been able to increase marginally the amounts
of money it has given the new five-year programme.
Q9 Chairman: I am just looking at
the funds, you see: terrestrial monitoring, £500 million
goes in; marine environment, £36 million. That hardly seems
to be a significant investment really. That has come from the
Environmental Research Funders' Forum.
Dr Webb: I would agree, there
does seem to be—
Q10 Chairman: A slight imbalance
there?
Dr Webb: Yes.
Q11 Chairman: It that just historic?
Dr Webb: I am afraid I do not
know. I have not seen the Environmental Research Funders' Forum
analysis so I do not know what is behind the terrestrial observation
from them, but I would imagine it is made up of the Environment
Agency and a whole load of other agencies; whereas, in the marine
environment, I think, the long-term monitoring, a substantial
amount of it is from NERC. I am not sure if that is true necessarily
with other organisations.
Q12 Chairman: Professor Dalton, do
you share that analysis, that it seems to be incredibly underfunded
compared with the work on terrestrial observation?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: I
think there is no doubt about it, it is seriously underfunded,
yes, and the figures you quote are quite right; it is an issue
that one has in marine science. I think actually what is interesting
is that people now are beginning to realise gradually, largely
I think through NERC's activities, that the marine environment
is extremely important, and particularly as an island we have
a great dependence upon understanding and working with the marine
environment. There are many issues which need to be addressed
right now and the Natural Environment Research Council, and to
some extent Defra and some of the other funding agencies, are
putting money into it, but I do not think it is enough, judging
by the value that the marine environment brings to the economy.
We are talking constantly of something around five per cent of
GDP, now that is a significant amount of money, and the amount
of money that goes into researching that and developing it I think
is really a very small part of that and needs addressing.
Q13 Chairman: As far as the Committee
is concerned, Mr Guymer, could you tell me, in terms of the priorities
which exist currently in terms of funding marine science, do you
feel that the different parts of the community have got it right?
If you were an agency, rather than an advisory committee, in fact
would you be putting money in different areas?
Mr Guymer: Given that marine is
rising up the political agenda, and particularly with the potential
Marine Bill in sight and the implications for global climate change
on the marine ecosystem, I think where there is a real need to
have additional resources, which may be a shift of funds, is into
the area of monitoring. We have identified that already, but it
is a very difficult area because it cuts across all of the different
departments and so that single fact makes it very difficult for
one department or agency or research council to say "We will
pick that up." I think that is the single most important
area I would identify where more resources need to be concentrated
if the UK is going to be able to underpin its policy in marine
better and if it is going to be able to fulfil its commitments
on the international scene as well.
Q14 Chairman: In terms of change
of priorities, where would you put your money?
Dr Newton: I will answer your
question, but I guess the way I look at it is this. About three
or four years ago, NERC had a pretty poor understanding of what
marine observations we were making, in fact probably in most areas,
largely because of the historical fragmentation of our investments,
we have about seven different research institutes which, for various
reasons, have different agendas. We did a review of our investments
in the marine sector and, as a consequence, we understand much
better now what we are doing and why we are doing it. We asked
our marine institutes, the institutes in which we have strategic
marine investments, to set the new proposal, which was Oceans
2025, as a co-ordinated proposal in the context of national and
international needs and explicitly to separate out of it the monitoring,
the long-term observation, so that we could crystallise that very
clearly. In parallel to that, we have got the Environment Research
Funders' Forum, which is a forum of all the different funders
of environmental research in the UK, and I think that was the
report you quoted from earlier. The report which you quoted was
trying to say, basically, "Okay, right across the environmental
sciences, what do we fund, in long-term observations; we do not
understand that very well, across all the funders?" We know
that now and, as a group of funders, we have decided to fund a
follow-on study, which is trying to move towards a strategic decision-making
framework for what sorts of environmental observations we should
be making in the long term and what time and space scales. To
me, that is the most important thing, that we have identified
a process, in investing resources, in trying to answer the question,
say, in one or two years' time, about where we should be making
the observations. I think that is the way I would like to approach
answering that question, rather than sort of the proclivities
or limited understandings of any one member.
Q15 Chairman: You are nodding in
agreement?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: Yes,
very much, and the observational side clearly is a very important
part and it is something which we have been flagging up for quite
some time. It is an area where we need these global observation
processes in place in order to make sure that we have got a lot
of the science in place that we need. We need these observations,
for the simple reason that there are a lot of things happening
right now. Climate change is a big issue, and going along with
climate change issues in the oceans is ocean acidification. The
amount of CO2 which is going into the oceans is causing some serious
problems, it is changing the biodiversity in those oceans; we
need to understand that better, we need to know what to do about
it when we can determine where the real problems are. We have
got real problems, as you know, with fish stocks, biodiversity
in the oceans, we need to understand that better; flood and coastal
management and other areas which are really important that we
need to be able to work towards. I think it is a whole number
of different areas, all of which are becoming extremely important,
which we need to be funding in the future. The question is, there
is insufficient resource, I think, to be able to do it. The Natural
Environment Research Council are the biggest funders of this.
Defra I know fund quite a bit of work in this area, but nowhere
near as much as the Natural Environment Research Council. It all
needs to be done, and it needs to be done not just from a UK perspective
but from a global perspective as well.
Q16 Mr Newmark: This question is
a follow-up question, to Professor Dalton. You said that the contribution
of marine activities is roughly 5% of GDP. The latest figures
that we have go back to 1999-2000, unfortunately, and, I am wondering,
currently is it still roughly 5% of GDP?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: The
figures we came up with, in the report which IACMST produced in
2002, indicated that it had gone up to 4.9%of GDP.
Mr Guymer: Yes, and if I could
come in there, there was an earlier study done in 1996 and that
was 4.8%, and following on the last select committee report by
the Lords there was a study done then, so that was 1990, and again
that came up with a figure of about 5%; so we think there is some
robustness in those figures. What I would add, as a rider, and
this may lie behind your question as to why there has not been
a study done since, is that getting this information together
requires considerable effort in getting the information from the
departments, so it is not the kind of thing that one wants to
do too often, particularly if you have limited resources.
Q17 Mr Newmark: Is it an art or a
science, defining what a marine activity is there?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: Do
not forget also, within that 5%, in those figures of 5% from the
1990s and 2004, was included the contributions from the oil and
gas sector. In fact, the oil and gas sector contribution to GDP
actually is going down slightly now and therefore we may not have
all of the up-to-date figures, which were, when it was measured
in 2004, the oil and gas industry was contributing 39% of that
5%, it may well be less than that now.
Q18 Mr Newmark: The figures remain
fairly stable?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: It
has been fairly stable.
Q19 Mr Newmark: In absolute terms,
it has gone up, so it is roughly £50 billion plus, yes?
Professor Sir Howard Dalton: If
you had got the current GDP, it would be about that, yes.
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