Examination of Witnesses (Questions 160-161)
Professor David Cutler, Dr Sandra Knapp and Professor
Richard Bateman
25 MARCH 2008
Q160 Chairman: Obviously a very pointed
question.
Professor Bateman: I am afraid I feel I have
to answer yes, it is, and it disappoints me that we have not been
able to present a more cohesive front. We have made progress,
but I do not think we have made sufficient progress. We have addressed
many of the reasons why this is the case already and we have to
some degree expressed concern about the fact that so much of the
taxonomic activity is now just based in three or, at the most,
half a dozen institutions, but what we have not commented on is
the fact that each of those three institutions is responsible
to a different government department and each of them is set very
different policy targets to address, so apart from setting standards—which
is what I just suggested this co-ordinating body might do—it
is not very practical for these organisations to get together
because they are addressing different sets of policies. So we
are fragmented. We could possibly do more about it than we do,
but a lot of the pressure causing that fragmentation is coming
from outside.
Dr Knapp: If I could just add one thing to that,
the fragmentation in part comes from something that Lord May referred
to earlier about funding basic research. If you think about taxonomy
and its three methods—phylogenetics, description and identification—phylogenetics
in part gets funded by research councils; descriptive taxonomy
is funded by the great taxonomic institutions of the country and
identification gets funded by the Darwin Initiative, a bit by
Defra and by the user community. That means that the funding structure
is fragmented and that in a way drives the fragmentation and the
discipline which is a vicious circle.
Q161 Lord Methuen: The RAE does not
help either.
Dr Knapp: Exactly.
Chairman: Thank you very much, that is a very
helpful and lively conclusion to this stage in the proceedings.
I have thanked you already for your written evidence but may I
add that if there are points that have come up in the discussion
that you would like to amplify in written form, or other points
where you feel that you could amplify what you have already produced,
that would be received with great thanks. Thank you very much
for your presence today.
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