Examination of Witnesses (Questions 80
- 99)
WEDNESDAY 25 FEBRUARY 2009
DR TIM
BRADSHAW, PROFESSOR
DAME JANET
FINCH, BARONESS
O'NEILL OF
BENGARVE AND
MS JUDY
BRITTON
Q80 Chairman: You are hedging your
bets now. Professor Finch, do you feel that the Government is
an intelligent customer?
Professor Dame Janet Finch: Obviously
as Co-chair of the CST I approach this from a slightly different
angle from the CBI. I think I can do no better than make reference
to the report that Lord Rees mentioned in your previous session
which is the Council's most recent report entitled How Can
Academia and Government Work Together? It is a report which
was actually commissioned by the Secretary of State, John Denham,
and has been published as part of a series of reviews of higher
education. Yesterday evening we had a specific launch of this
report in which we are analysing what the impediments are to greater
and closer involvement of academics, not only giving advice but
also supporting policy making within government, and how those
impediments can be overcome. I am very pleased to say that the
Secretary of State spoke at that event and announced that he has
commissioned an individual to produce an action plan based on
our recommendations. Certainly there is more that can be done
both at the university end and within government to encourage
more extensive, effective and closer working relationships between
academics and policy makers.
Q81 Chairman: In terms of the current
policy shift—whether it is huge or minor depends on your
viewpoint—was the CST involved in those changes?
Professor Dame Janet Finch: The
CST meets next week and we will be considering the recommendations
as we understand them that are coming from both the Secretary
of State and Lord Drayson, so formally we have not formulated
our advice to government yet. We expect to be doing that and we
will do it next week. I can draw on a number of things we have
done to date.
Q82 Chairman: Can I just stop you
there because I think the point of my question was, if the Government
has already made a decision and is then consulting you that is
very different to you being part of that formulation of policy.
Professor Dame Janet Finch: I
was sitting in the last session and I think my understanding mirrors
that of one or two of your other witnesses that government has
initiated this debate, has indicated that there are some principles
that it feels it needs to follow, but is still inviting inputs
to that debate. That is what CST expects to make.
Q83 Chairman: It is not a debate,
is it, when the chief executive of RCUK says that they are enthusiastically
supporting this initiative?
Professor Dame Janet Finch: I
have not read what Ian Diamond said so I cannot comment on that.
I think the principle of prioritising government investment in
research is well established so I do not know whether he meant
anything more than that. I really cannot comment.
Q84 Chairman: Baroness O'Neill, Tim
Bradshaw made an interesting comment about the need for greater
social science within government policy. Do you think that there
is a tendency in this particular debate about looking at where
we channel our efforts in terms of getting the greatest economic
benefit from our science and engineering base to ignore the social
science base?
Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve:
Yes, I think there is.
Q85 Chairman: What should we do about
it?
Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve:
I do have some ideas but first of all I think it matters to try
to see exactly where social science and humanities research add
economic value. I take it for granted it is part of the background
that they add value of many other sorts (cultural value, public
value and so on), but I think they add three sorts of economic
value. One is that where one achieves research in these areas
it has very considerable indirect economic impact. It is hard
to measure but we all know, for example, that sophisticated workers
in a knowledge based economy will wish to go to those countries
where there are these other things available. The second is that
they are the prime source of economic value for what we might
call the cultural industries and sector. We think immediately
of publishing, of international research students, of the BBC
and tourism and heritage which are very major employers in this
country. Again it is very hard to put your finger on the proportion
of their employees that is research driven as it is very hard
in engineering too to know what proportion of the value produced
and the employment produced lies in the quality of the research.
However, it is definitely a major source of value and employment.
Thirdly—I think this speaks very much to what Tim Bradshaw
mentioned—humanities and social science research is a crucial
adjunct for the intelligent innovation in all research, including
all stem research. I say a crucial adjunct because we all know
that we want effective rather then ineffective legislation but
we do not even know in this Parliament when we have produced ineffective
legislation as this Committee will be aware. We want to know which
management structures and which ways of working are effective.
For example, research done at Aston on team working tells you
crucial things about what works and what does not work. We want
to know about the ethical, legal and social implications of innovation
and then of course we want to know about the public engagement
matters. I put that last because it is mentioned most and it completely
underplays what humanities and social science research can contribute.
Q86 Chairman: I was surprised that
when Lord Drayson made his initial remarks supported by Lord Mandelson—or
perhaps it was Lord Drayson who was supporting Lord Mandelson—and
now it appears to have become hard line policy from DIUS, you
did not make any adverse comments. Clearly the assumption is that
if additional resources are going to be put into key areas of
science they are going to be taken away from arts and humanities.
Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve:
That is a simple assumption and I take it that you are correct,
that there is no expanding cake in these times. We suffer all
the time across the whole diverse research community from the
fact that money that goes here does not go there, so you do not
actually know in an absolutely clear way. My own view is that
step one to clarity is that when we talk about science we need
to remember that there is a distinction between science in the
broad sense f(or which DIUS is responsible through a number of
delivery organisations) and science in the sense of stem research.
It looks as though—but we have to say so far it is a matter
of speeches—stem research is being favoured and within stem
biological sciences looking to our glorious past and present,
so to speak. Whether that is the reality I do not know, but if
you want to have successful innovation you actually need to keep
the other streams going. I would want to generalise what Lord
Rees said when he pointed out that you are not going to do the
medical and biological research well if you try to shrink physics
or chemistry; I would say that you are not going to do the stem
research and stem innovation well if you try to shrink or do without
the other sorts of research.
Q87 Chairman: I find this a most
bizarre world that we live in. We are going to have greater concentration,
we are going to have more resources put into it, but nobody loses.
It cannot be that way.
Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve:
It cannot, that is correct.
Q88 Mr Cawsey: Dr Bradshaw, I understand
that you said previously that the US Defence Research Projects
Agency has a good model for building scientific and engineering
capacity. I am interest in what sort of lessons you think we can
learn for the UK patent. Is it the sort of model we should be
trying to instigate and roll out in this country?
Dr Bradshaw: I think the Technology
Strategy Board is developing in that direction which is what we
wanted to see. It is mission driven, but perhaps not as mission-driven
as DRPA is. DRPA has a very clear role, it is to look for radical
innovation in the defence technology area to avoid the US being
surprised and then to surprise its adversaries. If we adopted
that same sort of ethos in some of the other big challenge areas
in the UK—defence, energy, health or any number of other
areas—then I think we could lead the field on some of these
things. Their mission is very clear: innovation, challenge-led,
get out there and do it, cut the red tape. I think if we had a
little bit more ambition from some of our government departments
and delivery agencies to actually think some of the unthinkable
things, get rid of some of the on-going existing projects which
are not going to deliver and actually think something a little
bit more radically, then yes, we could deliver too. Do we have
that ambition? I would say perhaps not at the moment.
Q89 Mr Cawsey: Do you think that
is perhaps because we are trying to create something like it but
perhaps it is still a bit embryonic, still a bit lacking in ambition
and still trying to find its feet really?
Dr Bradshaw: The Technology Strategy
Board is getting there and I think the main problem with them
is that they just do not have the funding to take forward the
programmes of work that they know they should do. If you look
at things like the aerospace technology strategy that has been
set out for them very well, I think they are only funding about
a third of it. That is one area where there is a fantastic strategy
already written up, business knows what it wants to develop, the
academic researchers know what they want to develop and we are
just not being able to put enough funding concentration into that
to deliver it.
Q90 Mr Cawsey: I suppose in the end
that comes down to decisions right at the top of government and
this is more general to everybody, not just to yourself. We have
been told at previous discussions we have had that Tony Blair
was very keen on the science community and had them in for regular
discussions so that he was happy with what was going on, but perhaps
less so with Gordon Brown. That may just be that Tony Blair was
particularly interested rather than any criticism of the current
prime minister, but whether it is him or his strategy unit, do
the scientific community have the ear of government right at the
very top so that there is the drive and ambition to push these
things forward? I am really interested in a general comment from
any of you about how you are finding contact with government.
Professor Dame Janet Finch: The
Council for Science and Technology met the prime minister just
before Christmas.
Q91 Chairman: For the first time.
Professor Dame Janet Finch: Yes,
for the first time under the present prime minister. I think that
we found a very ready ear for the issues that we put before him
on that occasion. I am also aware that if government is to be
influenced at the highest level it is also important that the
Policy Unit and the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit and so on are
focussed on these issues and again CST has had recent and regular
contact with those groups. I think our feeling is that this Government
is taking science very seriously. That is partly reflected in
the past history of investment in science and all our recent contact
suggests that the Government is extremely serious from the prime
minister downwards about the importance of science in helping
us out of the recession. There may be debates about the ways of
doing that, but I do not think that we would have any doubt about
the seriousness of it.
Q92 Mr Cawsey: Do you think it took
the recession to get that interest?
Professor Dame Janet Finch: No,
I think the commitment to science and funding science has been
there for a long time.
Q93 Chairman: Judy, do you see a
lot of the prime minister?
Ms Britton: Not personally, I
have to say. The Government Office for Science has very, very
strong connections with the Strategy Unit through Foresight projects
and through our more general work. We meet very regularly with
them about what they are doing and what we are doing and how those
two can influence one another. I think how science fits more generally
into policy making is very much there on the agenda through the
various key themes that the prime minister has set out and so
on and does take very strongly how they actually do that.
Q94 Mr Cawsey: It is important that
it happens across government departments. How do you ensure that
that happens and what is your experience of that?
Ms Britton: We do that through
the community of chief scientific advisors which I think is getting
stronger and more effective all the time. A particular initiative
of John Beddington has been to gather the key ones together into
a core group working and challenging sometimes (on things like
the Gallagher Review of bio-fuels and peer review of elements
of government policy) just gathering together, talking on key
areas (like climate change, food, counter terrorism) and making
sure that everybody is joined up together and bringing together
work to feed into the policy of their departments. I think that
is working very well. Mentioning the research councils and their
themes, another initiative that John is just trying at the moment
is really to take some of those themes and say, "Yes, the
research councils are working on them but we need to be working
on them as well. How can we actually get together in these areas
to take them forward more strongly?" The research councils,
for instance, are working on environmental change where they have
gone beyond the research councils to gather people together and
the Government wants to be much more strongly linked into that.
That is one area. Another area that is he is wanting to look at
is global security. You will remember that John has very strong
views on all these different global challenges on climate change,
on food, on water, on population and migration and so on and how
we can actually work on those together. So another area he wants
to work with research councils on is global security. Finally,
he is actually looking at one with the research councils rather
than the TSB, looking at what the research councils know about
things like high tech manufacturing and also at the way the economy
develops and so on. That is a slightly different area that he
wants to get into, being an economist by background as well as
a scientist.
Q95 Mr Cawsey: Everybody thinks that
government departments would be well advised to take notice of
science in all that they do, but one of the problems is that the
number of scientists that go into the Civil Service is not as
high as perhaps they have been previously. It seems to me important
that we have some way of ensuring that civil servants have a better
understanding of science and have a better understanding of how
to make use of it. How are we making progress in engaging the
Civil Service so that science becomes a more core activity?
Professor Dame Janet Finch: I
have already mentioned CST's report on how academia and government
can work together. One of the recommendations that we make is
about building capacity within the Civil Service as well as capacity
within the academic community to engage more effectively with
each other and a particular part of that recommendation is the
significant extension of secondment schemes in both directions
and at all career levels. There are some good examples at the
moment. The ESRC has run a placement scheme for academics to work
on short term secondments—six months or 12 months—in
government to do particular projects. We would like to see a considerable
extension of that scheme across all the disciplines and also a
number of other ways in which the career progression of both civil
servants and academics can be more tied directly to effective
engagement with each other. There are quite a number of measures
that can be taken, we believe, that will encourage cultural change
both in the Civil Service and in academia to make this a much
more routine part of both sets of people's lives.
Q96 Dr Harris: Professor Finch, you
and the CST are independent of government, are you not?
Professor Dame Janet Finch: We
are part of government but we are an independent voice.
Q97 Dr Harris: So you are speaking
to us now independently.
Professor Dame Janet Finch: Absolutely,
yes.
Q98 Dr Harris: You do not have to
look over your shoulder.
Professor Dame Janet Finch: No.
Q99 Dr Harris: How often has the
CST met Gordon Brown?
Professor Dame Janet Finch: Once.
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