House of Commons - Proposed merger of British Antarctic Survey and National Oceanography Centre

Proposed merger of British Antarctic Survey and National Oceanography Centre - Science and Technology Committee Contents

2 NERC's consultation

The topic for consultation

10. In September 2012, NERC announced that it would carry out a "consultation on proposals to merge BAS and NOC".[22] This announcement stated there was a strong strategic case for merging the institutes. However, despite being described by NERC as a consultation on the proposed merger, the consultation document did not request views on whether a merger between the National Oceanography Centre and British Antarctic Survey was appropriate or desirable, or what alternative measures could be taken to achieve the desired strategic outcomes. Instead, the document indicated that "NERC is consulting its staff and stakeholders to invite ideas on how to implement the intended changes".[23] The decision to merge appeared to have been taken in advance of the consultation. We have been told that British Antarctic Survey staff did not regard this as proper engagement.[24]

11. Three key senior British Antarctic Survey staff, the Director, Deputy Director and Head of Corporate Services, have recently left the organisation.[25] Subsequently, Professor Ed Hill was appointed as interim Director of the British Antarctic Survey by the Chief Executive and Chair of NERC, without an open competition for the post.[26] NERC Chair, Edmund Wallis, assured us that this was normal procedure for interim roles.[27] Professor Hill is also currently Director of the National Oceanography Centre. In addition to his appointment as interim Director of the British Antarctic Survey, he was selected to lead the merger team and prepare the business case for the merger.[28]

The strategic case

12. The three reasons given for the proposed merger are: increasing scientific synergy between marine and polar science; translating scientific research into economic and social impact; and improving the cost-effectiveness of operations.[29] Whilst these are commendable goals, no evidence was provided in the consultation document that a merger would achieve them. In addition, NERC expanded these objectives later in the document, to include:

Focusing the UK scientific community on integrating research programmes;
Tackling the scientific problems of greatest global significance involving the oceans and polar regions within the Earth system context;
Translating scientific knowledge into societal impacts;
Stimulating the development and application of new observing technologies;
Securing efficiency savings;
Maximising resources available for science; and
Strengthening organisational resilience and operational flexibility.[30]

Later, in written evidence to the Committee, NERC outlined a third set of objectives for the merger:

To provide a future pathway for NERC strategic polar science presently delivered by the British Antarctic Survey that provided for the sustainability of the polar science activity;
To integrate NERC strategic marine science presently delivered by the National Oceanography Centre and British Antarctic Survey to allow for the most ambitious scientific programs addressing the large-scale complex problems of ocean and polar climate system;
To integrate NERC ship planning, operations and future procurement to provide the most effective, combined strategic use of the NERC marine fleet, and to ensure that future NERC ship provision seeks to optimise blue-water and polar requirements in single ship purchases; and
To fully engage the wider HEI [Higher Education Institute] community in NERC polar science at a strategic level and through increased interactions with the university sector, and to provide transparent access to all NERC polar infrastructure in a similar manner to that achieved for NERC marine infrastructure.[31]

We have therefore seen three different perspectives on why NERC considers a merger desirable and what the proposed new Centre would achieve. This gives the impression that NERC's thinking on what it hopes to achieve through the merger is still developing and is not yet concluded.

Business case for the merger

13. One of the three "fundamental reasons" for NERC's decision to change the structures supporting the British Antarctic Survey and National Oceanography Centre is "recognition of the increasing costs of providing major marine and polar infrastructure and of the need to plan and deliver this in the most cost-effective way, particularly at a time of downward pressure on public finances."[32] NERC described the pressures on its funding arrangements as follows:

NERC has had to accommodate a 3% cash reduction in its resource budget, amounting to an 11% real terms reduction by 2014/15. It also had its baseline capital budget reduced by 50%.[33]

14. The consultation document stated that:

Quantification of the expected costs and savings arising from the merger will form part of the business case that will be presented to Council in December. The numbers will depend on detailed assumptions which will be made, taking into account comments on the consultation document. It would thus be premature to pre-empt that process by offering figures at this stage.[34]

No detail or indication was given in the consultation document regarding the possible costs or savings arising from the merger. It therefore appeared that NERC was consulting on proposals for which one of the primary justifications was the need to reduce costs without providing any indication of the extent to which the proposals would result in cost reductions.[35] Indeed, NERC Council itself was not due to see a business case for the merger until December.[36]

Managing research vessels

15. The British Antarctic Survey and National Oceanography Centre manage almost all of NERC's large research infrastructure, for example research ships and polar research stations. The British Antarctic Survey operates two ice-strengthened Royal Research Ships, the RRS James Clark Ross and the RRS Ernest Shackleton.[37] These provide logistics and science support to the Survey's operations.[38] NOC operates two research vessels on behalf of NERC, the RRS Discovery and RRS James Cook.[39]

16. As part of the consultation, NERC outlined concerns that "the cost of operating NERC's research ships is rising as a proportion of its budget due to fuel, a shrinking resource base etc" and stated that it was "investigating the most effective ways of utilising and sharing these assets".[40] Under its proposals:

NERC's four Royal Research Ships [...] would become a single fleet within the new Centre with unified management of ship-related functions (e.g. marine operational activities, marine HR, marine engineering, maintenance and ship fuel procurement). The focus for ship management would be at Southampton. In order to operate NERC's fleet in an effective and fully-integrated way it will be desirable to harmonise marine staff and a variety of ship management processes and procedures over time.[41]

17. NERC has carried out a number of reviews of its ship operations in recent years, most recently in 2008/09 and 2011/12. These reviews have concluded that closer working between research vessels was desirable, where possible, but that the highly integrated nature of the British Antarctic Survey's operations in the Antarctic made the British Antarctic Survey's management of the RRS James Clark Ross and RRS Ernest Shackleton the most cost effective and efficient option.[42] The Marine Science Coordination Committee's Marine Research Vessels Group is due to publish a draft assessment of research vessel operations in autumn 2012.[43] This is expected to conclude that significant savings would only be achieved by reducing the number of vessels being operated. Changes to management or collaboration would provide only modest savings.[44] Despite the cost of ship operations being a key driver for NERC's desire to reorganise ship management, no information was given in the consultation document regarding the expected savings to be achieved from changing how the fleet is managed. The outcomes of previous reviews do not suggest that there are significant savings to be made in this respect.

18. We also heard about potential difficulties associated with merging the British Antarctic Survey's polar ships with the rest of the fleet, given their specialist nature. In particular, we heard that safe operation of the British Antarctic Survey's ice-strengthened ships requires different equipment and different skills from its crew, compared to other research vessels.[45] Changing the management of the fleet could also have implications for the safety of operations at sea, if the ability of staff to respond quickly to emergencies was diminished by a more diffuse management structure, especially as the nature of these emergencies may be unique to polar environments.[46]

Geopolitical considerations

19. The British Antarctic Survey is at the forefront of Antarctic science. However, this is not its only purpose. The Survey has a dual role in carrying out valuable scientific work whilst also contributing to Britain's presence in the South Atlantic and Antarctic. It is notable, for example, that the Science Minister's recent trip to the Antarctic included a visit to the Falkland Islands.[47] He restated the Government's commitment to Britain's presence in the South Atlantic and Antarctic during our evidence session with him, and stated that this presence would not be altered by NERC's proposals.[48] The British Antarctic Survey stated that its role included providing advice to the UK Government regarding the polar regions and overseas territories in South Georgia, the South Sandwich Islands and British Antarctic Territory.[49] This geopolitical aspect to the British Antarctic Survey's work is notably absent from considerations in the consultation document, save for a brief note that "the name British Antarctic Survey is internationally recognised".[50] There are therefore serious concerns regarding whether NERC has the competence to take decisions that potentially have such geopolitically significant consequences. During oral evidence, the Science Minister and NERC Chair conceded that there are lessons to be learned from how the geopolitical aspect of this matter have been handled during the consultation.

Environmental concerns

20. NERC identified a number of economic opportunities that it hoped the new Centre would be in a position to exploit. It identified the oceans and polar regions as "frontier environments" where "there will be increasing economic activity in the coming decades—not least because of increasing pressures on natural resources".[51] It also stated that a "key objective" of the Centre would be to "establish itself as a hub for innovation to harness and support growth of widely dispersed UK scientific and technological expertise to exploit these opportunities".[52] In NERC's long-term vision, the Centre would have a role in "de-risking major investment decisions in hostile, unfamiliar environments".[53] The Environmental Audit Committee raised questions with us regarding this commercial focus. It highlighted the importance of advancing scientific research but cautioned that "while such research might incidentally make it easier for those engaged in shipping, fisheries and oil and gas extraction, NERC's research should not explicitly facilitate commercial resource exploitation".[54]

22 http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/bas-noc.asp Back

23 Consultation document para 2, http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/bas-noc-merger-consultation.pdf Back

24 Written evidence submitted by Dr Julian Huppert MP - MS35 ; and written evidence submitted by BAS employee - MS36 Back

25 Written evidence submitted by John Dudeney - MS33 Back

26 Further written evidence submitted by NERC , para 14 - MS16a Back

27 See oral evidence transcript Back

28 Further written evidence submitted by NERC , para 14 - MS16a Back

29 Consultation document para 1, http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/bas-noc-merger-consultation.pdf Back

30 Consultation document para 15, http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/bas-noc-merger-consultation.pdf Back

31 Further written evidence submitted by NERC , para 13 - MS16a Back

32 Consultation document para 1, http://www.nerc.ac.uk/about/consult/bas-noc-merger-consultation.pdf Back

33 Further written evidence submitted by NERC , para 2 - MS16a Back