Priorities for the Science Base: Select Committee Report

HL Deb 03 March 1994 vol 552 cc1134-70

3.32 p.m.

Lord Flowers rose to move, That this House takes note of the report of the Science and Technology Committee on Priorities for the Science Base (2nd Report, HL Paper 12).

The noble Lord said: My Lords, I begin by thanking the Members of the sub-committee who joined me in preparing our report, Priorities for the Science Base. Several of them are speaking today and I thank them for that too. All of us would wish me to thank our clerk, Mr. Andrew Makower, whose ability to turn a mass of tangled undergrowth into a trimly pruned garden is phenomenal.

Warm thanks are also due to our specialist adviser, Dr. Peter Collins, and to the Royal Society for seconding to us someone as experienced as he in science policy. Last, but by no means least, perhaps I may thank our many witnesses from industry, Government and universities. That includes our first witness, Sir David Phillips, who has since retired as chairman of the now defunct Advisory Board of the Research Councils after many years of distinguished service to the administration of science.

The report is both wide-ranging and technical. It is wide-ranging because it examines within given resources how choices are made about scientific research, whatever the objective, conducted in universities and research council laboratories, no matter who funds it. It is about the science base.

It is technical because it examines the problem in the particular light of last May's White Paper, Realising our Potential. That White Paper promised many reforms of the system of government support for science and technology. Some of the recommendations were proposed in earlier reports of your Lordships' Select Committee and I gladly acknowledge that we have been listened to.

We did not consider the special problems of medical research, nor the European framework programme, nor the role of government research laboratories. They had been dealt with in earlier reports. We did not try to set priorities ourselves. Nor did we attempt on this occasion to make a case for increased resources. I do not mean that we considered present levels of spending on science and technology sufficient; we would like to see them increased. In particular we should like to see industry spend more on research; it is not just a matter for Government.

However, the chief purpose of a policy for basic science and engineering is to maintain a creative tension between excellence and utility. The best of British research is still first-class by world standards, although there may be less of it than once there was. We can no longer afford to support all the research our scientists and engineers consider important, no matter how first-class they may be. No country can. We should also support research which offers hope of fruitful application. In no circumstances, however, should we support second-class research, no matter how desirable its objectives. That leads nowhere. Instead we need to identify areas of particular significance to the progress of science or to its eventual applications and in which the practitioners are themselves excellent, and give those practitioners in those areas a measure of priority.

I am saying nothing new: that is the policy of selectivity and concentration which has guided the funding of basic research for 25 years or more. Where has it got us? Counting London and Wales as one university each (and ignoring the raucous protests of their more powerful colleges), there are now 87 universities in the United Kingdom including the former polytechnics. The research councils are open to proposals from all of them. Yet the largest and most general of the councils— namely, the Science. and Engineering Research Council (soon to be a blessed memory)— awards 60 per cent. of its grant money to just 16 universities. The other councils concentrate their resources even more densely. This de facto concentration shows that basic research has become a very competitive business. We thought that it had become a mite too competitive, and we recommended accordingly.

University people know why they want to do research. They find the pursuit of knowledge exciting, their teaching is enriched by the heightened understanding that it gives them, and they believe that they are contributing to human progress by the results and applications of their discoveries and by the training they offer through research. But since the taxpayer meets so much of the cost of basic research— it is about £ 2 billion annually— it is also right to ask others what they think the science base is for. Our industrial witnesses had a very clear message for us: the science base provides something important but different from what they themselves provide through in-house training and applied research. For example, British Aerospace stated: [It] makes an important contribution to the long-term technology investment which is needed by industry". What the CBI wanted was not particular competences which can be learned on the job, but, scientists and engineers of world-class training with a capacity to solve fundamental … problems". Above all, there was a rejection of the idea that the science base could be substantially funded through industrial research contracts. The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry put it very firmly: It is not the function of universities … to undertake research which has as its sole aim the production of marketable products and commercial inventions, but rather to provide the infrastructure on which UK industries can build". The Government, for their part, in their White Paper, explain that they want the science base to contribute to the improvement of, national competitiveness and quality of life". The means are, "a closer partnership and better diffusion of ideas between the science and engineering communities, industry, the financial sector and Government".

In particular, every government department is to receive a science and technology mission statement and every research council is enjoined to meet the needs of users and to support wealth creation. There will be a partial reorganisation of the research councils with more industrial involvement in their management and a director general of research councils to oversee them. Your Lordships briefly debated aspects of the reorganisation only last month.

There is to be a Technology Foresight programme under the direction of the new Office of Science and Technology. Government science and technology spending is to be the subject of an annual forward look. The Advisory Council on Science and Technology, with its independent chairman, is to be replaced by a council for science and technology with a Minister of Science as chairman and the chief scientific adviser as his deputy. Its remit is to receive reports from the foresight programme and to advise Ministers on the balance and direction of government-funded science and technology.

There is to be a new committee, bringing together the research councils and the higher education funding councils, chaired by the chief scientific adviser, so that the two sides of the dual funding mechanism will at last have to talk to each other. In general terms, we welcome all those measures, and I hope that some of my noble colleagues will tell your Lordships why.

In the time that remains to me I shall comment on the Technology Foresight programme and on structural arrangements within the Office of Science and Technology. In the words of the White Paper, the Foresight programme will attempt to influence the setting of priorities by means of a, systematic, well-informed assessment of the match between potential research outputs and the likelihood that they can be appropriated by firms and organisations". It is not a new idea and the UK is late in the field. A recent report of the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology makes revealing comparisons with fore-casting practices of other countries. Nevertheless, we welcome it.

However, there appears to be some confusion of purpose. A long-term sharing of vision between the science base, industry and government and a resolve to achieve that vision by acting in partnership is one thing. We welcome it. The process of short-term resource allocation is quite another. There are three timescales involved in government planning of research and each needs its own objectives and its own methods. There is next year's definitive public expenditure survey, for which procedures are well established. There is the Forward Look at government funded research and development, looking forward five to 10 years, which is a welcome development of the Cabinet Office's annual review, itself a response to an earlier suggestion of your Lordships' committee. And there is now the Technology Foresight programme which attempts to see what the future might hold 15 or 20 years ahead.

It is the last that is the natural timescale for planning and thinking about: basic research. We felt that we had to issue a sharp warning. Any suggestion that the outcome of the foresight exercise may be implemented — that was the word used— by top-down means or in response to short-term considerations should be resisted, we said. I hope that the Minister will be able to assure your Lordships that that confusion has already been resolved.

Many of our witnesses had a further message. It was that the foresight programme should not be used in the manner of yesteryear to select private sector projects for preferential public support. At best, it might indicate a set of generic technologies, as they have become known, which might be pursued preferentially. In technology foresight, the process is more important than the product. As Professor Howard Newby, outgoing chairman of the Economic and Social Research Council, put it: The value of technology foresight does not come from the particular recommendations that are on offer but from the actual understanding which is developed through the process of what each has to contribute". We have, on earlier occasions, told your Lordships that we greatly welcome the creation of the Office of Science and Technology with Mr. William Waldegrave, a senior Minister, in charge as Minister of Science. We were concerned, however, that responsibilities at the top of the office were not more clearly defined. Mr. Waldegrave invited us to image a troika, pulled by himself, the chief scientific adviser and the director general of the research councils. That somewhat rustic metaphor became politically intriguing when we were later invited to imagine the Permanent Secretary at the reins. Of course, we were exploring the accountabilities of the various persons involved and the apparent overlap of functions. I must confess that we found the confusion rather bewildering. I have no doubt that, with the most welcome appointment of Sir John Cadogan to the post of director general, matters have already become clearer, but I should still be grateful if the Minister would explain how the arrangement is to work in practice.

In particular, I wish the Minister to elaborate on the powers of the director general. Mr. Waldegrave said that Sir John's role would be purely advisory. He would not be the accounting officer for the research councils, as we would have wished because that would have given him an important measure of executive power which we wished him to have. That function will belong to the Permanent Secretary as the holder of the reins.

We were also concerned that Sir John's advice should be published and normally accepted and that if not accepted the Minister should explain why to Parliament. Otherwise, the chief executives of the research councils could readily marginalise, the director general. I have been the chief executive of a research council and I know how that is done.

We also wanted the director general to have personal control over a small proportion— perhaps 2 per cent. — of the Science Vote, so that he would have genuine powers to initiate. In short, we want the Minister to assure us that the director general will have the authority generally to direct.

In the last chapter of our report, we collate our conclusions to address the Government's concept of a strategy for the science base. Conflicting objectives and confusing structural arrangements are interesting and great fun for a committee, but our prime concern must be with the integrity of the science base and its relations with the other members of the partnership created by the White Paper.

Our main conclusions are set out in the summary. As far as the science base itself is concerned, the strategy must, first, leave room for new people who have not yet made their mark and for ideas too novel to have been awarded priority. That is the seed-corn; that is above all else what the science base is about. Secondly, it must be focused on long-term needs and not on the solution of short-term problems.

Thirdly, the science base cannot itself reverse our industrial decline, although it makes a vital long-term contribution. Many of the changes that are being urged upon the science base in the White Paper in the name of wealth creation have in fact long since taken place. Industry and government must now play their part in the partnership, and the Office of Science and Technology must monitor their progress through Forward Look.

Fourthly, inflexible concentrations of university research must be prevented. That means that those outside the big battalions must be carefully nurtured. The ratchet effect of funding formulae operated by the higher education funding councils must somehow be mitigated. If noble Lords will overlook a brief lapse into jargon, the "DevR element" in the funding formula should evolve from being merely a transitional measure to assist the former polytechnics into a permanent measure applicable to any university that is genuinely trying to develop its research potential. I should be interested in the Minister's comments on that suggestion.

Recent trends, I have to say, have been different. There has been increasing emphasis on income generation and the fashionable and too much reliance by many institutions on short-term industrial contracts. There is an urgent need for fresh strategic thinking. The introduction of even more industrial participation in the affairs of the research councils may be desirable; it is certainly not sufficient. If industry were so good at applying science there would be no problem; and if the science base were so bad at choosing the right research, its practitioners would not be so well regarded and their discoveries exploited abroad. That is why we ended our report on such a sober note, warning that if no fresh thinking is forthcoming the science base may go into decline. But I am encouraged by the general tone of the White Paper, by the quality of recent senior appointments to the Office of Science and Technology and to the research councils and by the support which the Prime Minister has consistently given to science and technology since he first came to office. There is a window of opportunity, and for a little longer I remain optimistic. I beg to move.

Moved, That this House takes note of the report of the Science and Technology Committee on Priorities for the Science Base (2nd Report, H. L. Paper 12)— (Lord Flowers.)

3.53 p.m.

The Earl of Selborne

My Lords, the House is deeply indebted, as always, to the noble Lord, Lord Flowers, for introducing this report so clearly, and indeed for steering the sub-committee so successfully through what I believe he described as a "tangled garden". I must pay tribute also to the noble Lord's very distinguished tenure as chairman of the Select Committee itself. I know that he will be watching his successor trying to grapple with the problems. It is a daunting prospect for myself as his successor. Indeed, I follow at some years' remove the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, who also chaired the Select Committee with such distinction. I consider it a great honour to have been invited to take on the post.

As the noble Lord, Lord Flowers, reminded us, the report is far-ranging and comprehensive. It helps to shed light on the purpose, the nature and the funding mechanisms of the science base. It certainly helps us to understand the nature of the recent changes— those in government organisation so far as the science base is concerned and science policy and also the changes of emphasis that we detect in the White Paper. The, noble Lord ended on a sense of optimism. I share that optimism. I believe that the creation of the Office of Science and Technology, with a Cabinet Minister, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, at its head, has been an enormous help towards promoting the role of science and government. I welcome the co-ordinating role that the chief scientific adviser has bringing together the research and development strategies of each of the government departments. I believe that the Office of Science and Technology can do much to bring science into playing a more central role in determining policies in government.

Having said that, I should like to strike a note of caution. As so often, this White Paper diagnoses the problems that we run into in this country in failing to exploit what is clearly by any standards a science base of high quality. The diagnosis follows fairly familiar lines. We have heard it many times before. The short-term approach of industry is referred to, as is the lack of links between research and industry. But I do not think that sufficient note is taken of the fault that government have fallen into in adopting over the years a short-term approach to science itself. That is a major problem which needs further exploring. By its very nature, fundamental and strategic research, whatever else it needs, needs continuity and a long-term approach.

Many noble Lords will remember,20 or more years ago— certainly the noble Lord, Lord Dainton, will remember— the debates at the time of Lord Rothschild. His particular concern was to involve spending departments that were responsible for executing policy more in the determining of research priorities. His solution to that problem was to give four departments a share of the science Vote fund. In practice, I believe that that approach has demonstrably added to the short-term, unpredictable nature of the funding of science in our research institutes and establishments of one kind or another. The departmental mission statement which was referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Flowers, will certainly not resolve this matter.

Perhaps I may refer to the evidence of Professor Blundell, who is chief executive of the Agricultural and Food Research Council. His research council is one of those which have been required to work closely with the funding department— in his case it is of course the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. Having been chairman of that research council I know how difficult it has been to detect a common strategy from one five-year period to the next— one could almost say from one year to the next.

Professor Blundell is quoted as saying (at paragraph 2.40 of the report): It is no good saying that this year we want this expertise and expect to close down another area and to pick it up in five years' time; it is not there". The report continues, meanwhile, retraining or releasing a scientist, if an expected contract is not awarded, usually costs the Science Budget a year's salary". In other words, chopping and changing is a very expensive activity.

Professor Knill, who was then chairman of the Natural Environment Research Council, had precisely the same complaint. Incidentally, he gave the Overseas Development Agency recognition that it did in fact operate from a "long-term horizon". But he criticised other government departments for, failing to provide for their own long-term strategic needs … leaving the NERC too dependent on small, short-term contracts". On the very day that the White Paper was published, the DTI announced that it was to cut back on research and development and move more into technology transfer. Technology transfer may be a very laudable area for the DTI to move into, but clearly it raises the question once again as to whether those departments are the proper repository of these research funds. I believe that while it is clearly the responsibility of the Office of Science and Technology to try to co-ordinate and achieve strategic thinking between departments, I have my doubts as to whether an adviser rather than a fund-holder will be able to operate more than at the periphery.

I myself would not necessarily be averse to seeing the Office of Science and Technology operating a science Vote itself derived at least perhaps from the Rothschild funds which were moved into the departments. Where it seems appropriate and there is a common interest between departments, it may well be wise to put it into the Office of Science and Technology rather than keep it in the departments.

Another aspect of short-termism arises from the operation of the dual support funding system. Again, witness after witness referred to the problems faced by the universities through the collapse— total collapse in some cases— of the dual support system. Sir Mark Richmond, chairman of the Science and Engineering Research Council, said that dual support had virtually broken down. Professor Andrews from the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales pointed out that it was the research element that enabled departments in universities to experiment and go off on research ideas of their own. At that point in time they may not tempt research councils but they will enable departments to build up research teams and encourage young scholars to take up post-doctoral research and nurture young lecturers. He said that it was absolutely vital that that research should continue.

But it is not continuing. As we have heard so often from the universities, there is a real problem there. Again, I ask the Government to take account of it.

What came out very clearly from the written evidence of the Wellcome Trust, and indeed the oral evidence that we took, was a further lack of stability arising from the level of remuneration of scientists and particularly younger scientists. We had informal meetings on two occasions with younger scientists and were struck by their dedication. We also noted the precarious way in which they had to live from hand to mouth on short-term contracts. They were very poorly rewarded. The written evidence from the Wellcome Trust stated that there was: evidence to show that salaries of UK scientists have declined by about 30 per cent. in relation to other comparable professional groups over the past decade". It went on: At the same time, career stability has been undermined, and established posts have been lost and replaced by short-term contracts". Again and again we were faced with evidence of a short-term approach to what must be a long-term activity; namely, the funding of the science base. It is a matter of great regret that the White Paper attributes that to just about every other organisation, from the research institutes to research councils to industry, all of which are accused of failing to make the right linkages; while the Government themselves have not recognised that chopping and changing from the customer-contractor system to the near market research, which the Chancellor now recognises was perhaps over-zealously pursued to the loss of vital parts of the science base. Those changes of direction have clearly been damaging and caused a lot of anxiety. The review of research institutes, which I understand is taking place at the moment, does nothing to allay those fears.

I hope that we can now have a period of stability. The Government have produced an excellent White Paper in many respects. The Foresight technology exercise and the Forward Look are important elements that are needed if we are to secure stability. I hope that the Government will now build on that very firm base. commend the report to the House.

4.4 p.m.

Lord Sherfield

My Lords, it is a pleasure as well as a privilege to follow the immediate past and present chairman of your Lordships' Select Committee on Science and Technology and to be the first to welcome this excellent and timely report. I also thank them for their clear exposition of the content and recommendations of the report.

When the White Paper, Realising our potential, was debated in this House, it had a favourable reception from all sides and indeed from me. It would have been inconsistent for me to take any other view, since in essence the document accepted the recommendations of the Select Committee's Report, Science and Government, which was published in 1983 and subsequently followed up by the committee.

It is true that we were rather tentative in our recommendations about the research councils. The White Paper has produced a far more radical and fundamental arrangement for the research councils which is now on the statute book. Nevertheless, it is entirely consistent with what we said on that subject.

This report is timely for two principal reasons. The White Paper set out a broad strategy and structure, but much depended on how these were applied or filled in and put into practice. The report comes out at a moment when the modus operandi is still being worked out. It switches on some yellow lights and points out some possible pitfalls before anything has been set in concrete.

Secondly, the report gives in clear and encapsulated form the views of the principal players, past and present, in this field: administrators, academics and industrialists. I hope that the views expressed and the committee's recommendations will be taken seriously, especially by government departments, industrialists and the City. The concept of partnership that lies at the heart of the system, which is strongly supported by the weight of the evidence and fully accepted by the research councils, will require complete reciprocity between all the parties concerned if it is to be successful.

One of the beneficial effects of the creation of the Office of Science and Technology and publication of the White Paper has been to push science policy much higher on the Government's agenda. Already this year there has been the very encouraging speech by the Prime Minister at the annual lunch of the Parliamentary Scientific Committee. That coincided with the debate on the research councils in another place in which the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster made an interesting and informative speech. Then came a similar debate in this House, to which the Minister made a positive reply. We are promised the first Forward Look next month and the first Technology Foresight report at the end of the year. It seems to me that both the Forward Look and Technology Foresight initiatives will have the effect of keeping science policy issues high on the parliamentary agenda and in the public eye.

The Technology Foresight programme is a relatively new concept in this country. It was fully discussed in Chapter 3 of the Select Committee's report and was dealt with this afternoon by the noble Lord, Lord Flowers. I therefore need not say much about it. It has been well described and analysed in a document published in January by the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST for short), which is now happily and securely incorporated into the parliamentary system. I may say, en passant, that the report is a good example of the useful work and help which POST can give in the future.

Although there are differing opinions about its value, it seems to me that Technology Foresight could be used to involve a large number of firms and individuals and so increase the awareness, especially in many parts of industry, of the importance of sustaining the science base. I am also encouraged by the emphasis laid on the public understanding of science by the Chancellor of the Duchy in another place. In spite of the efforts of the Royal Society, the Academy of Engineering and the British Academy in this field, progress in the public understanding of science, particularly in the areas affected by radiation, is slow. Mr. Waldegrave referred to a new initiative which he called Megalab UK. That was scoffed at by some of the Opposition speakers. But the matter is so important that any new initiative taken in this field is to be welcomed.

The report is not about funding. Indeed, we were given assurances that the size of the science budget will be maintained in real terms over the next two or three years. Nevertheless, total government expenditure on civil research and development across the board is set to decline. If a recent report is correct, that the DTI is dispensing with its chief scientist, that may be a symptom of what is in store for other departments. The right structure and organisation can ensure that the available funds are applied efficiently and to best advantage. But if adequate resources are not provided, our performance relative to our competitors— already poor— will decline further.

In conclusion, I hope the Minister will be able to give a positive reply to the debate and that the warnings in the report will be heeded on all sides. However promising, influential and effective the new scientific set-up may be, the old demons of short-termism, industrial indifference, lack of investment and underfunding are still lurking in the bushes.

4.13 p.m.

Lord Perry of Walton

My Lords, although I am a member of the Select Committee, I was not a member of the sub-committee that produced the report and I can therefore welcome it. All members may not be aware that the sub-committee, with only nine members, contains a former President and three other Fellows of the Royal Society, two former chairmen of research councils, five long-serving vice-chancellors, a former chairman of the University Grants Committee and an experienced chairman of a major scientifically based industrial corporation— a positive galaxy of talent and experience. I do not find it surprising therefore that I am in total agreement with almost everything that they said. Indeed, I find it difficult to add anything of great significance.

The Government's White Paper, Realizing our Potential, promoted a partnership between the science base, industry and government in a tripartite effort to improve national prosperity and the quality of life. It seems at first sight to be a wholly unexceptionable objective with which we can all agree. The views of the three partners on the proper strategy for the science base have been explored in detail in the report. First, as has already been stated, every government department has a mission statement that gives as one of its objectives wealth creation.

Secondly, industry naturally targets its own in-house research and development towards wealth creation. But — and it is an important "but"— on the evidence in the report at paragraph 227, industry appears to think that academics in the science base should not do so, but should concentrate mainly on training the high-quality scientific personnel that industry needs, and on carrying out "blue skies" research that every so often may throw up new insights, new techniques or new knowledge that will provoke industry to open up new fields of research and development.

Thirdly, the report quotes a great deal of evidence given by academics working in the science base both in universities and in research councils. In summary, at paragraph 5.4, it says, no-one is compelled to be an academic research scientist, and no-one does it for the money. So what is it that attracts bright young people to research careers in the Science Base? In paragraph 5.5 it gives an answer to its own question by quoting Professor Housley of Glasgow University as follows: Academics are geared to following research ideas that most excite them in essentially a 'blue skies' fashion; hence new ideas arise. Usually this is why people stay in academia rather than industry, i. e. they do not wish to be directed". It is quite clear that if research in the science base becomes so directed, then the supply of bright young men well trained in research, the very recruits which industry needs, will dry up.

At present the research councils are expected to undertake such research as government departments request of them, and academics working for the research councils must combine such directed research with their own blue skies research. The same is true of academics in those universities which undertake contract research. The essential problem in both cases is how to maintain a balance between blue skies research and directed research. When I worked many years ago for a research council there was in fact a very reasonable balance, and I believe that that is still true. I also believe that it is a precarious balance.

On reading the report, I was struck by the fact that the views of industry that were quoted supporting blue skies research in the science base were drawn, again in paragraph 227, from Courtaulds, Celltec, Unilever, British Aerospace, the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry and Sharp Laboratories. Those are all extremely large companies and all devote large sums to in-house research and development. On the other hand, if one looks at the evidence presented by the CBI, which represents some quarter of a million companies of all sizes, one gets a slightly different view. In their oral evidence— question 1009— they welcomed an increasing industrial representation on the research councils, and stressed the need to measure the success of research by its output. In other words, they were looking much more for wealth creation and a close co-operation with industry. I would myself guess that the demands of many of the smaller industrial companies would be very different from those of the bigger ones that are quoted in the report. We are all agreed that there is an enormous need for many more industrial companies to devote resources to research and development, but many such companies will be relatively small. In my view, most would want to get their research done not by building vast in-house resource but by contracting the science base to do it for them. I have a great fear that this may impose an increasing burden of directed research on the science base, and thus upset the present precarious balance.

The message I want to stress this afternoon is that the science base, by producing trained personnel for industry, is making a very important contribution to wealth creation. This tends to be overlooked by simplistic economic analysts. I would also maintain that the occasional vital contribution of a brilliant new idea more than compensates, in terms of wealth creation, for the expenditure involved in the large amount of blue skies research that is wholly unproductive.

I conclude by saying that this report treats a very complex problem with great wisdom and I believe that the Government should pay the most careful attention to it.

4.20 p.m.

Lord Dainton

My Lords, it goes without saying that I endorse all that de noble Lord, Lord Flowers, has said so eloquently in opening this debate. My endorsement also includes his more personal remarks about the sub-committee's Clerk, the specialist adviser and witnesses; and to this I would add my personal gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Flowers, himself for the skilful way in which he has conducted our deliberations and our interrogation of witnesses. It is a sad fact that, under the rules of this House, the Select Committee on Science and Technology is now, I hope only temporarily, deprived of his membership and therefore his wisdom and experience.

I shall not recapitulate the arguments for the Select Committee's recommendations, which I fully support. They are clear enough in the report. Indeed I intend to concentrate on a few underlying themes and start by reminding your Lordships that what we call the science base comprises those natural scientific, engineering and technological activities carried out in universities and research council institutions, all supported by government funds.

As it happens, when I was thinking of this speech, suddenly thought that my lifetime spans the period in which almost all that has happened in the formal arrangements between the Government as paymaster and the science base as performer has taken place. The MRC, the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research and the UGC were founded just before I entered primary school; the Agricultural Research Council just before I left secondary school. For almost 34 years thereafter they were left undisturbed. But the 30 years following the Trend Report in 1963 saw the pace of organisational change quicken, and the proportion of our gross domestic product spent on the science base first rose and then entered a period of decline.

To the original trio of those research councils were added the Natural Environment Research Council and the Social Science Research Council, which is now the Economic and Social Research Council. The Council for Science Policy was created to advise the Secretary of State for Education and Science, to whose department responsibility for funding the five research councils was passed. Seven years later, in response to the Rothschild and Dainton Inquiries, to which the noble Earl, Lord Selborne, referred, the relations between the research councils and government departments were revamped and the Advisory Board for Research Councils replaced the Council for Scientific Policy. In the 1980s the UGC was replaced by the Higher Education Funding Councils, now territorially based and which operate an a priori based formula funding. Then, two years ago, the Government appointed a Minister for Science, which we all welcomed, with a budget and an Office for Science into whose care the five research councils were put and whose first decisions are in the White Paper, Realising Our Potential, the consequences of which are another major upheaval in progress, the possible effects of which on the science base were the subject of the Select Committee's report now being debated.

There must be many in the House who will ask why this section of our government-funded activity is subject to so much repeated scrutiny and change. The answer lies in some fundamental relationships. Natural science is now the knowledge base on which advances in engineering, which were originally based on empiricism, have in the past two centuries become almost exclusively dependent. It is the rapid advance of science which dictates the need for many other changes. Furthermore, technology, which provides the means nowadays of producing all that we need to ensure health, transport, communications, food, shelter and so on, is dependent on engineering.

That is why the science base which generates first-class, well-educated scientists, engineers and technologists, and a corpus of knowledge in these fields which is both fundamental and later applicable, is so important to the well being of this country. Nothing must be done to damage the quality of work which it does. But since the United Kingdom cannot cover in depth more than a limited number of areas of science and engineering, one has to ask how choices are to be made which maximise the benefits which can be derived from the amount of money that Parliament is prepared to invest in the science base.

There are two complementary methods which are referred to in the report. The first is the maintenance of excellence, which means funding first-class people with good ideas; the bottom-up responsive approach. The second is to identify desirable technologies and ensure that the base can give adequate support to those technologies. This is the Technology Foresight or top-down approach. In passing, I should like to join in the congratulations to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster on making a start with that latter process of technological foresight.

Getting the balance right between those two processes, which is the job of the Council for Science and Technology, is bound to be difficult and we expect — at least I expect— that the balance will vary over time. But with all this change one thing remains certain. If the science base produces enough people of high quality and relevant experience to go into and be properly used by industry, then UK Limited will prosper. Therefore the universities must have the resources to identify and educate such able people who will be the seed corn of the future, and funding mechanisms must adapt themselves to achieve this and give some stability. By the same token, mechanisms to ensure that useful ideas become a practical reality must be devised, and this in turn requires more partnerships replacing existing barriers to permeability of ideas across the boundaries separating industry, government and the science and engineering communities.

Mention of the word "boundaries" causes me to comment that there are boundaries within the science base which give cause for concern. These are the boundaries, now increased by five, which separate research councils from one another. Because scientific principles are universal and transcend boundaries between scientific subjects— and many of these subjects such as chemistry, physics, biology, geology and so on are very interdependent— and because many practical problems, such as the preservation of global biodiversity, require for their solution input from many subjects, it is essential that these boundaries do not become impenetrable ring fences. Otherwise some multi-disciplinary areas will become nobody's business and therefore be neglected. Systematic biology, which was the subject of another inquiry by the Select Committee, is just one such case which has arisen recently, and chemistry, so vital to the health of so many other subjects, could easily also suffer a similar fate. Therefore these demarcation lines between the research councils must be permeable and variable over time.

I think your Lordships know that my view has always been that this calls for a unified national research council, the responsibilities and resources of the various divisions of which, not being set in tablets of stone and not protected by Royal Charters, can easily be varied. But the Government have decided otherwise. All we are to have is a Director-General of the Research Councils. In those circumstances it is absolutely essential— and here I speak from my experience as the first chairman of the Advisory Board for Research Councils, just as the noble Lord, Lord Flowers, spoke retrospectively of his chairmanship of the Science Research Council in that period, so as poacher and gamekeeper— that from the beginning this new Director-General of the Research Councils should not be merely decoratively marginal but have the clout to make what territorial changes he regards as necessary in the missions of the research councils after proper study of issues, and taking account of changes in national need and developments abroad as well as at home.

Make no mistake, my Lords, the pace of change will not decrease; and only an adequately funded, easily steerable and flexible science base will prevent the United Kingdom from being left behind. I hope that the Minister can reassure us in the way suggested in Chapter 3 of the report on that vital point. I also hope that she will clarify the basis of the less than completely transparent working relationships and responsibilities involving what has been referred to as a troika, but in fact I think of the English analogy of the four-in-hand because it consists of the Secretary of State, the Permanent Secretary, the Director-General of the Research Councils and the Chief Scientific Adviser. Any confusion or ambiguity of the relationships and functions at this level could be very damaging to the whole enterprise.

A little earlier I referred to the dependence of technology on engineering and of engineering on the natural sciences. That sounds like a linear relationship; but in fact it is a circle, because developments in technology and in engineering often provide the tools for the further advancement of natural science and engineering. So that circle has the potential of becoming the dynamo for change which, if properly exploited, can be the means of achieving the twin goals which the White Paper addresses. I mean by that the enhancement of the quality of life and the creation of national wealth.

Those developments are not going to happen automatically. There must be in place effective brokerage mechanisms to ensure that what is in the science base and of practical use to industry and Government, can be identified, drawn out and exploited. While the appointment of a part-time industrialist as the chairman of each research council will assist industry in its perception of the research councils, it is more important to increase awareness in industry of what the science base has to offer. The Economic and Social Research Council has already shown that it could have a valuable role here, although industry must also be ready to interact and to develop and exploit wherever it can.

To achieve good results between the science base and the government departments which have a large stake in the use of science, engineering and technology, it will be necessary for each side to know the other's capabilities and limitations. This is not a matter which can be left to chance, and here I see a key role for the Chief Scientific Adviser, whose position and duties give him an unrivalled vantage point to see both sides and to effect the necessary brokerage. I hope that the Minister will be able to confirm that the Chief Scientific Adviser's influence will penetrate the government departments to the degree which is necessary to achieve that end.

A 100 years ago it was possible for an inventor to say, as Edison is reputed to have responded when asked what use was all his experimentation,"Damned if I know. But sure as Hell they'll tax it one day". I have tried to emphasise matters are now somewhat more expensive and complicated; but two things will always be true. First, if the UK science base falters in quality or in effective interdigitation within industry and government, we shall all be worse off. Yesterday's articles in the Financial Times show how far the United Kingdom and Europe have slipped in the 1980s behind the USA and Japan.

Secondly, in a country of this size the science base cannot effectively do everything; choices must be made, as we all know. What the Select Committee on Science and Technology has tried to do in its recommendations is to state what is needed to keep the science base healthy and to make good choices within the new structures which have been put in place by the Minister, and I commend these recommendations to the Government.

I have no doubt that the research councils which have to bear the brunt of these major upheavals, will accept them with good grace and work well within the new system, not least because they were consulted in early discussions in an entirely admirable manner. What they need now more than ever before is, as has been said, a period of stability. But they— and here I speak of the scientists themselves within the science base— are at present much disturbed by the intrusion, either actual or in immediate prospect, of the efficiency unit into the affairs of the research council institutions. The noble Earl, Lord Selborne, has already mentioned that. Once again, those scientists feel that change is imminent and this has set back morale. Can the Minister assure this House that the period of stability so necessary to carry this next step forward to fruition and for first-class scientific work is not now again at risk?

4.36 p.m.

Lord Tombs

My Lords, my contribution today is that of an industrialist with a long association with the science base, having been a member of the Science and Engineering Research Council and of the Advisory Board for Research Councils; later chairman of the Advisory Council on Applied Research and Development (ACARD) and then the Advisory Council on Science and Technology (ACOST), in the formation of which an earlier report of your Lordships' Select Committee played an important part. ACOST has now been succeeded by the Council for Science and Technology, which is to be chaired by the Minister rather than by an independent chairman, as was the case for ACARD and ACOST. I am not convinced of the desirability of that change.

This may be an appropriate time for me to say a few words about the work of ACOST, a much underrated body in some quarters. Its many reports and conferences are of course well known, but its influence in government circles is not, since the advice which it gave to government remained confidential.1 make no criticism of that practice; indeed, much of the influence which ACOST had depended on the fact that its advice was not published. But there is certainly an increased awareness in government circles of the importance of science which owes much to the activities of ACOST and to the support which that body received from the then Prime Minister. I hope to be convinced that that role can be as effectively performed from within the government machinery.

The general thrust of the White Paper is welcome, as is the fact that the science base has become a subject of government anxiety. The Select Committee draws attention to a number of respects in which responsibility is not clearly defined as yet and we must expect that experience will rapidly lead to the remedying of those defects. However, I believe that almost any organisation can be made to work, given the right people in the key posts, and we have made a good start in the Chief Scientific Adviser and the Director-General of Research Councils.

So I am less concerned about organisational shortcomings than I am about what seem to me to be excessive expectations of the role of industry in the process of the selection and exploitation of science. There is, to be sure, a need for a close understanding between scientists and industrialists if the potential value of our scientific activity is to be realised for the national benefit. But, that is no new discovery; closer links between researchers and industry have been developing over the past two decades and I shall not weary your Lordships with the many examples of this, some of which are mentioned in the report.

But it is certainly not the case that industrialists are omniscient— an assumption which seems to me to pervade much of the argument in the White Paper. There are many examples of academic researchers whose contribution to the exploitation process is as good as that of leading industrialists, and so I find undesirable the notion that research council chairmen should necessarily be industrialists. We are looking for a partnership in which the best talents are employed, irrespective of label.

The role of industrialists in all parts of the process is an important one, but one has to recognise the regrettable fact that much of industry is indifferent to scientific research. There are many ways of tackling this serious shortcoming, but it does not follow that involvement of that part of industry in the management, selectivity and predictions envisaged in the White Paper will be fruitful. We may be putting the cart of involvement before the horse of awareness.

Of course, there are industrialists, many from large companies, who are well aware of the processes and promises of research. But such people are already deeply involved in the science base both personally and through their companies and are certainly not to be looked to to represent the views of the uncommitted sectors of industry.

Perhaps, therefore, the pendulum has swung a little too far in the belief that industry can produce the changes which the White Paper seeks. I believe it to be of the utmost importance that the contribution of industry at large to the process of realising our scientific potential should be continuously evaluated so that, if the process requires adjustment, as I believe that it will, it can be achieved at an early stage in the development.

The White Paper was an important document, signifying the welcome commitment of the Government to the development of science and its contribution to national prosperity. I wish it every success and I hope and believe that the report of the sub-committee of which I had the honour to be a member will help that development.

4.41 p.m.

Lord Butterworth

My Lords, since the White Paper Realising our Potential and our own report were published, the new structural arrangements for science have gradually been taking shape. Only this week, for instance, we have learnt that the Technology Foresight programme is to have 15 sectors; that each sector will have a panel led by a chairman and a deputy chairman and that, wherever possible, one will be an industrialist and the other an academic. That is a move which points up the systematic partnership between the science and engineering base on the one hand and industry on the other. I think we are all agreed that if it is to be successful, Technology Foresight needs to be driven by such a partnership.

Another piece of the machinery which I hope is taking shape is the new Science and Engineering Base Co-ordinating Committee, the creation of which was welcomed in our report with the words: It has important work to do". That committee will bring together the heads of the research councils and the chief executives of the higher education funding councils.

It is my understanding that the co-ordinating committee has already been set up and has, in fact, had several meetings. I was therefore surprised to be told in the Times Higher Education Supplement by Dr. Lewis Moonie, the Opposition spokesman for science and technology in the other place, that almost a year after the publication of the White Paper, the membership and remit of that important co-ordinating committee has still to be formalised.

I hope that the Minister will be able to clarify the matter and let us know whether or not that important committee is operating because its creation impacts upon a crucial aspect of our debate: the importance of effective co-ordination between the research councils and the funding councils to make sure that the two streams of university funding truly complement each other.

While I am in this area, perhaps I may be allowed to refer to the dual support system, mentioned by my noble friend Lord Selborne. I do so because many of us are concerned about the training of young scientists, especially those not yet senior enough to make their own applications to the research councils. It was the White Paper of 1991 which brought about the important change in the dual support system by saying that the research councils would become responsible for the full costs of research, including overheads. As a consequence, a once-for-all transfer of resources is being made from the funding councils to the science budget. When it is complete in the year 1994– 95, that transfer will amount to no less than £ 150 million. In our report we state that there is some suspicion in the universities at any rate at this early stage that the research councils are not returning the whole of that money to the universities. Our report recommends that if that exercise continues and the research councils find themselves with more money than they need, the surplus should be returned to the funding councils.

I think that I would now be inclined to go even further. Ought we not to admit that the dual support transfer to the research councils was a mistake and reverse it? It is clear from the evidence that we now have that the dual support system has virtually broken down. It has virtually ceased to exist. The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has said that he regards the continuance of the dual support system as important and has no plans for further transfers.

If the money were handed back from the research councils to the funding councils, it would have to be distributed by them with due regard for their new principles of selectivity, but that would have the advantage that more funds would be managed by those universities which are already regarded as excellent in scientific research. It is no good saying that we should practice subsidiarity in Europe and not practise it at home. The nearer that the management of cash takes place to the coalface of science, the greater the opportunity for management to apply those funds in ways which will ensure that young scientists are given the opportunities and the training that they need. The primary responsibility for young scientists under our present set-up remains with the universities rather than the research councils.

Finally, I refer briefly to the problem of the constitutional roles of the chief scientific adviser and the director-general of research councils. I too very much welcome the appointment of Sir John Cadogan as director-general, but I am not at all convinced that it is constitutionally appropriate or wise that the advice of a civil servant should mandatorily be published. I shall be glad to hear in due course what is the Government's reaction to that recommendation.

Secondly, there is need for clarification of the division between the roles of the chief scientific adviser, Professor Stewart, and the director-general. Professor Stewart, as the administrative head of OST, did much to deliver the White Paper, which our committee warmly recommended. However, his White Paper is coy on the division of responsibility between the two officers. It states: The Chancellor will in future be supported in exercising these statutory functions by a new Director General of Research Councils located within the Office of Science and Technology, enabling the Chief Scientific Adviser to concentrate upon his responsibilities for the lateral science and technology issues across all government departments". The paper goes on to detail the responsibilities of the director-general. I am afraid that our report could have been clearer. Paragraph 3.57 states that, the Chief Scientific Adviser must be seen to leave Research Council matters to the DGRC". Yet in paragraph: 5.12 it states: `The Chief Scientific Adviser must be given a degree of authority over the science spending plans of Government departments". I hope that the committee is not inconsistent on that matter. I would welcome anything the Minister can say on the relationship between the two officers. In my view, they should be encouraged to achieve the greatest possible interaction. They have become two of the most powerful advisers in Whitehall. I am happy to know — or I have been given to understand— that they work together exceptionally well.

In view of the statement by the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, that we expect, in real terms, that science funding will not remain the same, I wish to make one point. The Prime Minister referred to the problem at the function of the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee. It is important to put his comments on the record. He said: Despite the absolute necessity of restraining public expenditure, we expect spending on the science base to rise in real terms next year. And science will remain a high priority in the future". I hope that I too have concluded on a note of optimism.

4.54 p.m.

Lord Porter of Luddenham

My Lords, today I wish to refer to only two points in the report before the House, embellished slightly with my personal prejudices. Together with my colleagues on the committee, I welcome the White Paper Realising our Potential. It contains much wisdom and provides a useful starting point for further progress. Unfortunately, both the starting paint and the undercurrent of some of what follows show a misreading of the problem that is addressed.

The importance of wealth creation is beyond dispute. The story that has been received wisdom for several decades is that our basic science in the UK is very good yet our industry is not competitive and that our science is exploited for wealth creation by foreign companies rather than by ourselves. But we cannot complain at one moment that our basic science has got its priorities wrong and in the next sentence say that foreign companies are exploiting those ideas. As the Daily Telegraph put it: Britain appears devoted to destroying its science base to save the embarrassment caused by its inability to exploit ideas". As we have heard, for most of this century this country has had the best science base in the world. I do not believe that that statement is over the top. Why is it then that at the height of our scientific prowess there are still those who would have scientists change their ways towards short-term exploitation, even if it means that ultimately we shall have no science to exploit? Once a base of knowledge and skill has been removed, the cost and the time factor involved in its restoration make it virtually impossible to catch up with the uninterrupted competition.

Sir David Phillips told us: If one wanted to reform the state of UK industry it is al least arguable that one would not start by worrying about the science base". Sir Mark Richmond said: The piece that is missing, I think, is the White Paper, sponsored by the DTI, on how the science base is pulled through into industry". Sir Geoffrey Allen, Head of Science at Unilever, said that it is industry that needs to be made more aware of science rather than vice versa. Dr. Lackie of the Yamanouchi Research Institute rather mischievously suggested that the reason why the Government focused on the science base is that this is the bit that can be manipulated easily.

The White Paper Realising our Potential contains a number of proposals for managing the science base. The main new proposal, about which we have heard this afternoon, is the technology Foresight programme. However, we must not expect too much from that. First, it has been done before in the United States, Japan, Germany, Holland and other countries, and there have been numerous think-tanks, seminars and brainstorming sessions in this country too. Of course, the technology that we try to foresee is not significantly different in the United Kingdom from elsewhere. Science and technology are the most international of human activities and therefore it is unnecessary for every country to go through these exercises separately.

The fact that forward looks and foresight programmes of the past have not led to directives that were implemented is perhaps fortunate. If such programmes led to short-term directives to the science base, irreparable damage might be done, as my noble friend Lord Flowers has warned. But to be fair, the White Paper reassures us that the Office of Science and Technology is not in the business of picking winners. So what is the use of technology foresight? It is more than might appear from my negative remarks so far.

There was general agreement among our witnesses that, although the results would be meagre and soon forgotten, there was value in the process of discussion which would provide an important bridge between industrialists and scientists. It is to be hoped that when the bridge is crossed there will be somebody on the other side.

In conclusion, I wish to comment briefly on a rather different point concerning the proposal that research graduates should do a MSc before they get stuck into real research. There was very little support for this as a general proposal and quite strong opposition from the Royal Society, the Royal Society of Chemistry and the many industrial representatives, which saw no need for it.

I understand that the Government have promised to look again at that point. For years many university departments have insisted on an MSc as a preliminary to a PhD. It serves the useful purpose of finding out whether the student is likely to be successful in subsequent research studies, and sometimes it is a useful stand-alone degree for further training in some ancillary to the subject of a first degree. For example, in engineering it can be a valuable bridge between academia and industry. But for many students the MSc serves little purpose. Those going into industry are often better off learning their trade there, and for those going on to a PhD in the university, the best way to learn how to do research is to do it under the guidance of a good research scientist, and to begin as soon as possible.

The genius of Newton, Einstein, Davy and Maxwell was apparent before they were 21 years old. That genius could well have been sacrificed on the altar of yet more lectures. The talented young scientist is a delicate plant which matures early and does not flower for long. In nurturing these talents flexibility must be paramount in our minds.

5.2 p.m.

The Earl of Halsbury

My Lords, in thanking my noble friend Lord Flowers for his work and the work of his committee, and for the report that we are debating this afternoon, I note that most of the speakers have been members of that committee and have consequently dealt with points of detail which are of interest to them. I hope that your Lordships will indulge me if the matters I raise this afternoon are in rather more general terms.

Our dramatis personae are the universities which I regard as self-governing communities of scholars dedicated to knowledge as good in itself; the preservation of knowledge in compendious libraries— a university without a library is almost unthinkable; the dissemination of knowledge— their teaching function; and the expansion of knowledge— their research function. Here I would endorse everything said by my noble friend Lord Porter on the representations of the Royal Society of Chemistry in paragraph 2.64 about the four-year MSc degree.

One must not tamper with the education of chemists. The chemical industry is a science-based industry from the very beginning. It produces a surplus of £ 3.8 billion towards our balance of payments and it lives entirely off the educated young chemists, many of whom attained PhDs at the universities. More MScs of a four-year standard for the same sum of money means fewer PhDs and the robbery of the input of highly qualified people to the chemical industry.

The Achilles' heel in our universities is equalitarism. Parity of esteem in senates between disciplines is accepted, but that does not mean parity of expenditure in councils. Different universities have different words for senates and councils. I simply use the terms of the university of which I have the honour to be Chancellor.

At this point I should like to quote three obiter dicta by distinguished scientists in the context of paragraph of 2.68. The late Sir Thomas Merton, treasurer of the Royal Society, often used to say to me that scientists are of two types, explorers and colonists, and the explorers are very few and the colonists are very many and much dispersed. The late Lord Blackett's words on this subject were, "The research does one of two things: either trying to understand something or trying to do something". As an example of something we understand but do not know what to do about, take the JET laboratory where we are trying to make nuclear fusion work in a finite apparatus. We understand the principles of nuclear fusion very well, but we do not know how to accomplish it.

The third principle was that of my late friend Lord Robbins who taught me that all decisions are concerned with the application of limited means to competing ends. My noble friend Lord Flowers said that we can no longer do all that we should like to do. We never have been able to do all that we should like to do. This is a perpetual state.

Perhaps I may now deal with the various councils involved. I may say that I have lived through a large number or reorganisations and redeployments in the course of 45 years' involvement with the research councils. That is over half my lifetime. I sat on two of them, was a party to setting up a third, and their appurtenances have occupied a very great deal of my life.

We have the funding councils on the one hand and the research councils on the other. The distribution of responsibilities between them, to which the noble Lord, Lord Butterworth, referred, is to some extent the subject of our debate this afternoon. Let me then make clear in what respects the Government are responsible for research.

There are certain things which a government must do because nobody else can do them; for instance: a bureau of standards, miscalled the National Physical Laboratory; the ordnance survey of the country; collating the geological survey of the country with the various geological surveys produced by interested parties; the Meteorological Office; defence research where it involves a security problem. The Government must do all those because nobody else is in an authoritarian position. The ordnance survey can be the basis for litigation and what the courts will accept as a plan of the country.

Now I come to what the Government should not do. They should not do anything that is better done by somebody else. Let research be done where its side effects can be exploited by people who have vision into what those side effects are — that is, in industry. For one industry to license another industry and find a licensee is a very different matter from a government employee trying to do the same.

I come now to what the research councils should not do. As patrons of universities regarded as clients, they should not compete with their clients by running their own laboratories. To give an example of that, I am very interested in work done at the National Institute of Medical Research, but I am not sure whether it ought not to be decentralised and its various sections become the outstations of various medical schools. They would then be subject to peer review. At present, every establishment run by a research council in the executive sense is not subject to the peer review that obtains in the applications from universities for research of "special timeliness and promise"— the sacred words which were used to set up the original Department of Scientific and Industrial Research

The appointments to research councils raise a very difficult matter. I have very strong views on the fact that you can delegate authority but you cannot delegate responsibility. You cannot make somebody else answerable to the source of your authority for that for which you are answerable. I mistrust the appointments of chairmen of councils of one kind or another, compared to what I am used to in industry. Under the Companies Act, the chairman of the board is appointed and elected by the board. In the eyes of the shareholders, he is merely a director— one of those whom they re-elect from time to time at annual general meetings every three years or so, or whatever the Companies Act or the articles of association provide.

I well remember an incident in the career of my noble friend Lord Flowers when I was sent as an emissary, by the council of which he was a member, to the Secretary of State— I believe: that it was Tony Crosland— to say, "We want Brian Flowers as our next chairman". The council authorised me to do that and sent me as an ambassador to the Secretary of State. He obliged his council. Therefore, my noble friend was first among equals because we made him so. The morale was enormously heightened by the feeling that our chairman was a colleague and an old friend.

I am worried about appointed chairmen and appointed members from the standpoint of my doctrine — if it is my doctrine; I do not know— of the exercise of authority and collective responsibility.

There are a number of what I call "fad" words in circulation. Such words are fashionable for a time. They are said to assist ore's thinking, but I believe that they are a convenient escape from thinking. Some of those words can be found in the report. Once upon a time "automation" was a fad word. "Fifth generation computer" was another fad phrase which spread into Europe. "The customer-contractor principle" was a phrase which sorted out nothing and did nothing. "National competitiveness" and "quality of life" take us into the sphere of my noble friend's report, as do "the generation of national prosperity" and "wealth creation". I do not believe that the consideration of wealth creation in the abstract will have the slightest effect on the decisions that one takes. That brings me to "technology foresight". I do not believe that much will come of that.

I should like to conclude my remarks by giving your Lordships a history of real development; that is, the history of the Torotrack transmission system, which was invented by a German called Hoffmann in 1890. He never put it into practice and it was forgotten about. In 1958— 36 years ago— a couple of young engineers who were running a vehicle repair business reinvented it. It was the reinvented bicycle. It was a continuous variable speed transmission. I was then managing director of BTG and I backed that scheme because I felt that those young men had some fire in their bellies and I thought that their proposal was extremely elegant. There are various solutions to the problem of a continuously variable gear but none of them is elegant. In electronic engineering it is represented by the Ward-Leonard set. In hydraulic engineering, it is a couple of swash-plate pumps back to back, one acting as the drive and the other as the driven. But they are very noisy. The proposed scheme seemed to be extremely elegant. Of course, I did not know that it had been invented before.

I skip now to about 1970, and the drive was installed in the Harrier vertical take-off plane. That is 12 years after I had initiated the scheme as fit for NRDC sponsorship. Then in the middle 1980s, there was a partnership with Rover. That partnership was dissolved but from it came a prototype vehicle which could be driven around a test track. That vehicle is now driving around the motor industries of Europe, demonstrating its paces.

I come to 1994. There is now a contract with Ford for a demonstration set-up as a possible design feature of a new model of the Ford motor car. To date BTG has coughed up £ 6 million. That would all have gone down the drain but for two key constituents contributed by other technologies which were never imagined when the work began. One was the development of the negatively thixotropic Newtonian lubricant. These lubricating oils go solid in the nick of a roll so that the two metal sliding pieces never come into contact with one another, because the lubricant solidifies to prevent them from doing so. When the stress is relieved, it liquefies again. The other contributor is the silicon chip. The transmission has taken 36 years to develop and it is not finished yet. What would Technology Foresight have done to that 36 years ago? In the report, there is reference to that under what is called a "hunch". I have a hunch that if I had done my work more thoroughly, I should have found that it was an old invention by a man called Hoffmann in Germany in 1890 and I would have said, "There is nothing new about that". It is terrible to confess but sometimes hunches are better than scholarship. The Toro track gear is lighter, cheaper and 15 per cent. more effective than any other competitive continuous gearbox. On that note, I thank my noble friend Lord Flowers and I shall resume my seat.

5.16 p.m.

Lord Morris of Castle Morris

My Lords, the House will be grateful to noble Lords who have commented on the report. There has been a galaxy of talents; and, surprisingly, the debate has ranged extremely widely. In his skilful introduction of the report, the noble Lord, Lord Flowers, mentioned the vital necessity of greater financial support from industry. That is one of the few themes which has come through the debate. But he stressed also the importance of the creative balance between excellence and utility.

The noble Earl, Lord Selborne, welcomed the creation of the OST; but he struck a note of caution about our continued failure to exploit our research and the short-termism still to be found both in government and in industry.

The noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, pointed out that there must be— I use his phrase— "complete reciprocity" between all the parties if progress in British scientific research is to be made. He mentioned with approval Technology Foresight and the public understanding of science, although he felt that little progress is yet to be seen in that regard.

The noble Lord, Lord Perry of Walton, agreed. He stressed the problems of the proposed parties to the partnership. From blue-skies research to blue-chip research is a very wide spectrum and a very long haul. The noble Lord, Lord Dainton, demonstrated the complex links between the government office and the research laboratory, and the difficulties created by the rate of change. He felt that the identification and nurture of excellence and the development of a Technology Foresight movement is fundamental to the creation of the balance. He saw a key role for the chief scientific adviser.

The noble Lord, Lord Tombs, has great industrial experience. He defended ACOST and mourned its passing. He pointed out that it may be that the White Paper expected too much from hard-pressed British industry. He asks whether the pendulum has swung too far.

I greatly enjoyed the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Butterworth, who considered that the dual support transfer was a mistake. He believes that the dual support system has real value, as I do. Science needs subsidiarity.

The noble Lord, Lord Porter, accepted the importance of wealth creation but warned us that we must not destroy the science base because we cannot exploit its ideas. He asks where is the White Paper emanating from the DTI.

The noble Earl, Lord Halsbury, took the widest view. He told us of educated young chemists who are the salt of the earth. He reminded us that universities are not about equality; quite so. There are certain things which only the Government can do.

Your Lordships' House is extremely fortunate to have some of Britain's most distinguished scientists on its Benches. I wish there were many more of them here, especially on the Benches behind me.

Any fair-minded person reading the Government's White Paper on science policy would find little to quarrel with there. Indeed, he or she would find little there to bite upon. It is full of high hopes and unexceptionable generalisations, noble aims and cheerful optimism. It would be unfair to say that reading it is like eating candy-floss; it is more like chewing cotton wool in that it is unsatisfying, tasteless and extremely low in nourishment.

The Select Committee's response to it is grave and takes the White Paper seriously; but I think I am not alone in detecting beneath its measured tone an underlying feeling of exasperation, not unakin to that we might expect from a grandmother being told at great length how to suck eggs. The heart and centre of the White Paper is the pious hope that someone, somehow, somewhere can create a partnership between the science base, the Government and British industry. That is the way ahead which will solve all our problems and give us all, a happy issue out of all our afflictions". Unfortunately, the White Paper fails to tell us how this desirable consummation is to be achieved. The Select Committee's report, with devastating understatement, states the bleak truth— it will not happen by itself. I quote the report's words at paragraphs 2.4 and 2.7: On 13th July 1993 we met the Minister responsible for the Science White Paper, Mr. William Waldegrave, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for Science … He agreed with us that basic science cannot be justified by pretending that it can all be applied; but, he insisted, when times are hard the taxpayer cannot be expected to fund basic science 'unless the wealth creators in society see the value of it—. He continued: 'There is only so much that Government can do to bring the horse of British industry to water. If the horse refuses to drink, the horse will die. It is essential to get across the message that industry must take its own responsibilities. We are trying to build a proper networking with them … but ultimately the industrial side must, I hope, respond". Thus spoke Mr. William Waldegrave. It sounds a shade shrill. There is no evidence that the industrial horse wishes to drink. British industry is simply not responding to the Government's request. It has not done so in the past, or there would not be any need to exhort it now, and it will not do so in the future because it does not see the need. Either the OST must convince British industry and convert it to the truth or it must offer it such tax incentives or access to risk capital as are necessary to entice selected, targeted industrial companies into this partnership so devoutly to be wished.

Unfortunately, our Minister for Science— who is also and principally in charge of the Citizen's Charter — rules over a small department, with comparatively little money and no powerful influence over how we manage our scientific and technological resources. The OST cannot force industry to take action but, as the Select Committee report suggests, the DTI quite possibly could. Yet the omens are not propitious. The report states at paragraph 2.73: The DTI might offer inducements from its Innovation Budget, but the closure of the Advanced Technology Programmes suggests that it will not". It seems that the besieged and beleaguered OST cannot expect the DTI cavalry to come charging over the hill to rescue it.

So the central hope of the White Paper seems doomed to be frustrated. The report's sober recommendation at paragraph 2.75 sums up the situation. It states: If the new partnership only operates in one direction, it will do more harm than good; it must be even-handed. We recommend that the response of industry to the White Paper initiatives be monitored carefully by the OST". Industrial firms in this country must be trembling in their boots. Their response is to be monitored! If the monitoring reveals that their response is minuscule, irrelevant or inadequate, what will happen? The "industrial horse" cannot be forced, beaten or shot. It will simply plod on in its own way, with a supreme disregard of both government and the science base, except where those bodies assist firms to develop or make a profit. Market forces rule; self-interest reigns supreme; each of us must look after number one. The Government cannot cover their nakedness with the rags of their discredited ideology and beg industry and the science base to buy them a new suit as an act of social charity.

The solemn tone of the Select Committee's report arises from its experience of the past. Across all government departments expenditure on science and technology has suffered for the past 10 years. It is argued that the science budget— that is, the budget of the research councils— has not fallen in real terms. That is true. Let us not hear it again. But the money has been stretched to breaking point by the new demands placed on the research councils year by year, and by the steadily rising costs of carrying out research. And in other areas of government spending on research and development there has been an undeniable collapse in funding. Civil research and development is only just over half in real terms what it was 10 years ago. Can it be denied that Britain is the only OECD country apart from New Zealand. and Turkey that has seen a decline over the past decade in expenditure on R&D as a proportion of GDP? If it continues, British applied and pure science research will become shabby, second-rate and uncompetitive

The wet-nurse of all scientific research in this country is the British university system and the institutes of the research councils. The Select Committee's report makes, at paragraphs 4.76 to 4.86, a number of clear-sighted and practical recommendations about selectivity, about the R-T-X model, about "hot spots" of excellent research, and so on. But all these are simply means of arresting decline. Let us look back over the past decade. Professor Steve Jones states: Ten years ago, universities basked in a `dual support' system. There were two channels for government funds. Through one which still exists came sustenance for fully planned projects, formally proposed to the research councils and often involving hundreds of thousand of pounds. The other, less well known, was just as crucial. Each laboratory had a modest but guaranteed income which allowed it to maintain its basic services and even to keep its researchers supplied with enough resources to pursue novel ideas. Now, allegedly in the interests of efficiency, one of the channels is being blocked. Dual support is breaking down: only those capable, fashionable and lucky enough to win endorsement for a formally presented application win any backing at all. Under the new system, every new thought must be referred up the administrative chain for approval before it can be pursued. The previous 220 words are not mine, nor are they the Labour Party's. The words are those of Professor Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College, London, a Reith lecturer, and a scientist of international renown, who speaks, I am certain, for the overwhelming majority of his colleagues in scientific research. The CVCP makes the same point when it states: Money left in the HEFCs' grant for research is too small to enable universities to initiate "blue skies" research and to adequately support the "well-found" laboratory". As a former Professor of English I could have done without that split infinitive but I take the point. And of course university research staff have now come to be regarded as little more than gifted shop-assistants, to be hired and fired at whim, less secure in their profession than any good garage-mechanic.

The position of contract researchers has also worsened as universities come to depend increasingly upon external research contracts as a source of income. Such contracts are mostly fixed-term arid project-specific, and as such, potentially a cause of great exploitation of researchers. The number of fixed-term contract researchers has more than doubled since 1979 from 8,000 to well over 17,000. That has repercussions on career patterns. Any discussion of the future of the science base must take account of the most important resource of all— the people who work there.

The Select Committee's report is published many years after the Government withdrew from near market research, that ideological experiment that went disastrously wrong. Yet it is still the market that is expected to drive, fuel and fund our science and technology policy. As my honourable friend Dr. Lewis Moonie has recently written: The OST has managed to shed some ideological baggage but only on its own territory. There is no indication that anyone else in Whitehall has followed suit". The OST, waving its little White Paper, is looking increasingly forlorn. The Select Committee's report deals comparatively gently with it. We on these Benches endorse every word in that report.

5.30 p.m.

The Minister of State, Department for Education (Baroness Blatch)

My Lords, it is no exaggeration to regard the issue of priorities for science, which is the subject of today's debate, as crucial to the future of this country. Therefore, I should like to put on record the importance of this debate. I should also like to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Flowers, on his committee's report. It provides a clear and cogent analysis which reflects the considerable knowledge and experience of the subject of members of the committee. I have also listened with great interest to the contributions to today's debate, and I am sure that both the report and the record of the debate will repay careful study.

The importance of the science and engineering base was recognised by the Government in last year's White Paper on science and technology, Realising Our Potential. I am pleased to see that at many points the report welcome the policies in that White Paper. it is rightly concerned that the spirit of the White Paper is carried through in the implementation of those policies. The Government share that concern and we shall want to consider carefully what the report has to say.

This is the second debate on the subject in the space of a month. I recently had an opportunity to report to the House on the progress made in taking forward the policies in the White Paper on a major part of the science base, the research council system. Although I regarded it as a serious event, I understand that the media found some parts of it amusing.

The House approved the draft orders creating three new research councils, and I am pleased to say that the orders have now been approved on behalf of Her Majesty the Queen in Counsel. We are well on course to have the new research council system up and running from 1st April.

A number of important points have been raised in the report and in the debate this afternoon. There will, of course, be a full published response to the report in the normal way when the Government have been able to consider the recommendations further.

The report's overall message is that strategic thinking is needed for the science and engineering base. The Government agree. That is why the White Paper was subtitled: A Strategy for Science, Engineering and Technology". The Government also agree with the committee's main conclusions about the nature of that strategy: in particular, that it must leave room for new people and new ideas; that it must be focused on long-term needs; that industry and government must play their part in the new partnership, and must be flexible enough to support excellent research throughout the science base.

A major theme of the White Paper was the need for a new partnership between the science base, industry and government. Chapter 2 of your Lordships' report addresses the way in which that partnership will be taken forward and is generally supportive of the measures we have proposed. To quote from paragraph 2.71 of the report on this subject: We warmly welcome the White Paper 'Realising our potential'. It acknowledges real problems, and proposes real measures which if implemented in the right way could bring benefits to science and industry alike". This debate has been concerned with making sure that that is implemented in the right way.

The Government believe strongly that that partnership between science and industry is vital to our success as a nation. Some noble Lords have been concerned that we have placed too much emphasis on the science base and not enough on industry. I can assure the House that we fully recognise that for the partnership to work there must be commitment from both partners, from industry and the science base. That point was very well made by the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris. We are not concentrating only on the science base. We shall be looking for a clear response from industry to our policies.

The noble Lord, Lord Moms of Castle Morris, if I may put words into his mouth, appeared to regard the approach which the Government have taken as a toothless tiger. I want to pose a number of questions to him, although clearly I do not expect a response to them. But what does the noble Lord suggest: compulsion? A research levy on companies? I believe, and the Government believe that the way forward must be to engage interest, involvement and investment but on a voluntary basis.

Lord Morris of Castle Morris

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for giving way. I do not want to interrupt the flow of her speech. I would find it extremely irritating to be interrupted all the time. I promise not to do it again unless hideously provoked.

What I should like is tax incentives and access to venture capital. Those are two aspects. They were mentioned in the report and they took my eye and captured my imagination.

Baroness Blatch

My Lords, I do not think that there is a great deal between us and I shall do what I can not to provoke the noble Lord during the course of the debate. I have a vested interest in not doing that.

The central theme of the report and of this debate is the way in which decisions are made about priorities in the science base. Some anxiety has been expressed that the effect of our policies, in particular the restructuring of the research councils and their new missions, will lead to a damaging move away from long-term, basic research.

I remind the House that the White Paper made clear the Government's continuing commitment to basic research. Paragraph 3.17 explained that in the new research council structure all five natural science councils will support the full range of underpinning disciplines appropriate to the pursuit of their missions and that individual councils will undertake the lead responsibility for the health of particular disciplines. The Director-General of the Research Councils will be responsible for keeping under review the boundaries between councils to ensure that all disciplines are properly covered.

In that regard, perhaps I may reassure the noble Lord, Lord Dainton, that the director-general will not be purely decorative. He will have real powers to enable him to carry out his important responsibilities, as I shall mention later.

However, we want to ensure that systems for setting priorities within the science and engineering base take proper account of the prospects for practical application of research. Some of your Lordships have suggested that this risks turning our universities into a kind of contract research agency for industry, focusing on short-term research with immediate applications. I can assure the House that that is not our intention. We agree with the committee that such a policy would not be in the best interests of the science base, of industry or of the United Kingdom. It is industry's job to support short-term research with immediate application; the focus of the science base should be on the long term and on excellence in basic and strategic research.

The noble Lord, Lord Flowers, raised two specific points on the setting of research priorities, first, in relation to the technology Foresight programme and, secondly, on structural arrangements in the Office of Science and Technology and the role of the director-general.

The purpose of technology Foresight is to identify areas of research with the potential to lead to a range of commercial applications in the medium to long term — up to 20 years ahead. Perhaps I should alter that to 26 years in the light of what the noble Earl, Lord Halsbury, said. I can assure the House that we do not expect the results of the Foresight programme to translate directly into decisions about short-term research programmes. Rather, we see it as one aid to making decisions about the overall balance of programmes.

As the noble Lord, Lord Flowers, acknowledged, no country can afford to support all the research its scientists and engineers consider important, no matter how first-class they are. Difficult decisions need to be made about the areas which need to be nurtured in the medium to long term and those which may be of reducing importance. We expect the results of the Foresight programme to be one of the factors which will influence the research councils and the higher education funding councils in their decisions about priorities.

The noble Lord, Lord Flowers, also asked for clarification of the role and position of the Director-General of the Research Councils. The new director-general is indeed a vital post, and the Government have been very fortunate in securing the services of Sir John Cadogan. In terms of his responsibility versus that of Ministers, it is inherent in our parliamentary system that ultimate responsibility should rest with my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. But the director-general is clearly in the line of authority over the policy, resource and management questions on the research councils system within government.

The noble Lord. Lord Flowers, expressed regret that the director-general is not the accounting officer for the science budget. It is, however, standard government accounting practice that the accounting officer role should rest with the permanent secretary of the department, in this case with Richard Mottram as head of the Office of Public Service and Science.

That Sir John has the real authority needed to carry out his duties effectively has already been demonstrated in the announcement last month of the science budget for 1994– 95. My right honourable friend made clear that the redistribution of £ 15 million for new programmes was attributable to advice from Sir John, notwithstanding his short time in the post. Sir John has already, to use the excellent phrase of the Select Committee, shown that he has the flexibility to touch the tiller of the science base.

The noble Lord, Lord Dainton, was concerned again about the role of the chief scientific adviser and the relationships between the permanent secretary, my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and the chief scientific adviser. He referred to four.

Several noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Dainton, have questioned the role and relationships, and the appointment of the Director-General of Research Councils will have the effect of freeing up the chief scientific adviser to advise on science and technology issues across government. Several noble Lords have mentioned the importance of that function: that it should not be departmental. We should look right across the pistes in these matters. The chief scientific adviser remains the adviser to the Prime Minister and will have the new role at his disposal through the new Forward Look and the Council of Science and Technology.

The report also looks at priorities for the universities, which form the major part of the science and engineering base. The universities are independent institutions, free to pursue their own missions in research as in other areas. There is no value, as the Select Committee recognises, in a rigid hierarchy of research or teaching universities. That would only impose a mission on each institution, stifle innovation and discourage diversity. Nor would spreading funds more thinly provide value for money or promote excellence.

Some universities engage in basic research, others concentrate more on applied research, often commissioned by industry for specific purposes. Both have their place. If we are to secure the most effective use of resources, it is essential to encourage universities to recognise their individual strengths and to play to them. The framework of research selectivity which has been developed by the Higher Education Funding Councils is designed to promote that.

Yet the system also allows flexibility. Funding is related to the quality of individual departments rather than institutions. A few universities have high quality across the board. But the system also allocates funds to individual high quality departments in institutions which otherwise have middle or low ratings. Moreover, all the funding councils have included provision within their research allocations for funds to support the development of research outside the traditional centres. I am sure that they will want to consider carefully what your Lordships have to say about the continuing importance of these development funds in maintaining the health of the system.

Because funding is allocated as a block grant, universities are free to decide how to spend it— for example, by funding promising individuals in otherwise low-rated departments. They can also encourage co-operation between departments and with other institutions. All these factors should protect the seedcorn of the future, allow innovation to flourish and new research and new research centres to develop

The block grant from the education departments and higher education funding councils is one side of the dual support system for supporting university research. The other side is the research grants available for project funding from the research councils. My noble friend Lord Selborne referred to the importance of the dual support system and the role of the research funding channelled through the higher education funding councils. The Government agree that universities need to have access to funds which they can use at their discretion, for example, to fund seedcorn research. The White Paper made clear the Government's continuing commitment to the dual support system for university research. It recognised the need for good working links between the funding and research councils within the system. To that end the Government announced the creation of a new Science and Engineering Base Co-ordinating Committee. At this stage perhaps I may say to my noble friend that I am sure that the whole House will join me in congratulating him on taking up the mantle of chairmanship of the Select Committee following the work of the noble Lord, Lord Flowers.

The committee brings together the chief executives of the funding and research councils, the Director-General of Research Councils and representatives of the four United Kingdom education departments under the chairmanship of the chief scientific adviser. Perhaps I may say to my noble friend Lord Butterworth that the committee has met several times since it was established last summer. It has made arrangements to involve other funding bodies such as the Royal Society and the charities in its work and to have discussions with the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals and other representatives of higher education institutions. It is proving an effective forum for discussion and co-ordination of science and engineering based issues.

The dual support system has been queried by a number of noble Lords in the course of the debate. The purpose of the transfer was to achieve greater clarity over the responsibilities for project funding. My right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has been monitoring the research councils' spending to see that the funds are being used as intended. The British Universities Finance Officers Group accepted in its report for the CVCP last year that the transferred funds were being channelled back to the universities.

Arguments that the transfer should be reversed ignore the problems which led the Government to introduce the change. It is important that there should be clarity over funding responsibilities. There is inevitably a learning process as all those involved, researchers and administrators, understand and properly apply the new rules. It will take time for the new system to bed down.

The Government are committed to making the new system work as effectively as possible. They accepted the recommendations in the report from the Universities Finance Group, including the recommendation that there should be an independent review of the arrangements after two years of operation. That review will be carried out later this year.

The report singles out as one of the key roles of the universities the training of future scientists and engineers. Your Lordships reported that many industrialists regarded people as the most important output of the science base. The report identified the supply of researchers trained to international standards as a priority, and, in welcoming the White Paper's proposals for improving the career structure of contract research workers in universities, the committee asked for a commitment to the funding of individual fellowships to be carried forward on a large scale. I am pleased to report progress in meeting these points.

Last month the Office of Science and Technology published a consultation paper on the White Paper policy that research students supported by the research councils should normally complete an initial year of Master's training. The Master's year is intended to provide the students concerned with the skills and knowledge not only to tackle further research training more effectively but also to enter a range of careers outside as well as inside academia.

The purpose of the consultation is to see that we take full account of the views of universities and employers in taking forward this policy. The consultation paper makes clear that our aim is phased, not forced, implementation. The policy will need to take account of the different patterns of course provision in different subject areas and also differences between industry sectors in their demand for trained researchers.

Beyond the training stage, the White Paper suggested a range of measures to help the universities develop their role as employers of new academic researchers. The Government have begun to implement these measures through the announcement by my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Duchy, of extra money for the Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering to expand their fellowship schemes. That will help ensure the supply of highly qualified people to fill academic vacancies as they arise.

To turn to just one or two additional points made in the course of the debate, the noble Lord, Lord Porter, and others referred to the issue of postgraduate training. Our aims of broadening postgraduate training generally and making it more relevant to employment have been well received. They were based on the widespread view, well expressed by the Royal Society, that some degree of flexibility and versatility should be incorporated into PhD training. That should include elements of non-science specific training, and at the very least should include communication skills and, where appropriate, the management of human material and financial resources.

The policy says that students supported by the research councils should normally complete a Master's year. This will help to assess the student's suitability for further research training but also provide a valuable qualification for those who, for whatever reason, do not proceed. The year will probably need to include some experience of research, the acquisition of further specialist knowledge and communication and other skills of use, both in research and other careers. We have already had helpful spontaneous comments from industry and academia. The White Paper indicated that there would be further widespread consultation and the Office of Science and Technology has now issued a consultation paper inviting comments by the end of April.

The White Paper made clear that implementation of the policy would need to be phased and flexible; for example, to take account of some four-year first degree courses which might fit students for direct entry to PhD.

A comparison was made between the United Kingdom, America and Japan. I thought it might be at least worth putting on the record that the figures are quite interesting. In terms of expenditure on R&D, if one takes the total figures, Japan and the United States of America come top of the league tables. Even if one takes the civil proportion of that expenditure, Japan will come first and the United States of America third. In the first table on total expenditure, the United Kingdom is fifth, followed by Canada and Italy. The same is true on the civil proportion. The point that I think needs to be re-emphasised again and again in terms of the Government funding of research and development, whether one takes the total amount of money or that spent on the civil proportion, is that Japan comes at the bottom of the list in both columns and the United States of America, high on Government defence-related research, is right at the bottom of the list on civil research. There is a real message for industry, if it is listening.

The noble Lord, Lord Perry of Walton, and other noble Lords again highlighted the balance between blue skies and near market research and that point is well taken. The noble Earl, Lord Halsbury, in his as always fascinating contribution to the debate, reminded me personally of my own children, my son and daughter who are twins. My daughter is now an air traffic controller and the aeroplane for which she is responsible is that wonderful example of technology, the Harrier. My son is a young chemist in his final year of studying for a PhD. What the noble Earl had to say struck quite a chord with me.

The other point that the noble Earl, Lord Halsbury, made, as did other noble Lords in the debate, was to warn us all of the dangers of short-termism. That point is well taken. The final point on the additional matters was made by the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield. He mentioned Forward Look. The system is now transparent. The item of science and technology is on the agenda; we will be reminded of it annually, and the House will have opportunities to return to it. We have a Prime Minister who has shown considerable commitment to science. We have a separate department, the Office of Science and Technology, specifically established and concerned with science, headed by a Minister of Cabinet rank. The annual Forward Look, the Foresight programme and much greater transparency will all serve to keep science and technology well and truly on the agenda. In conclusion, let me return to the overall theme of the report, the need for a national strategy for the science and engineering base. The Government see science and engineering as vital to the health of the nation. The creation of the Office of Science and Technology and the publication last year of the White Paper are evidence of its importance.

We also agree that strategic thinking is needed. The Government's role is to put in place structures which encourage and enable such strategic thinking. That is the purpose of the new arrangements now being put in place. The Council for Science and Technology, chaired by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, will advise the Government on matters of national importance in science and technology. The Forward Look of government-funded research and development will bring together each year the programmes of individual government departments to give an overview of the totality of funding of science and technology. The Technology Foresight programme will help to identify where long-term investment is likely to be most beneficial, and assist in forging a closer partnership between the science base and industry.

Within the science base and the universities, we believe that the structures now being put in place will provide a sound framework for development of that partnership. The committee has in general welcomed the structural proposals, and has done some valuable thinking about how they should in practice be developed.

We will consider the report very carefully and provide a formal response to it in due course. We will also take account of the analysis and recommendations in the report as we continue to implement our policies for the science and engineering base. As expected, the debate will prove a valuable supplement to the report and a contribution to the important subject which. as I said at the outset of my remarks, is crucial to the future of the country.

5.55 p.m.

Lord Flowers

My Lords, I must not make another speech and I cannot, if only because I can no longer read my notes. At any rate, perhaps I may thank noble Lords for their support and their kind remarks about me personally, not least my noble friend Lord Halsbury, who seems to have been of greater service to me in the past than even I had imagined. It was a great pleasure also to listen to the noble Earl, Lord Selborne, who has now succeeded me as chairman of the Select Committee. I wish him much joy on it. I also enjoyed the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, under whose inspiring chairmanship I served for so many years. They both expressed the importance of reciprocity between the partners—industry, Government and the science base— and the damage caused by short-term attitudes towards the support of science and technology. I very much agreed with what they said.

It is not for me to comment on all the speeches made, but perhaps at least I may say how much I also welcomed the contribution of my noble friend Lord Tombs, the only industrialist to speak this afternoon. He spoke well, but the absence of other industrial participation today is perhaps symptomatic of the problems we have been discussing. Of course, they are busy people, but then so are the rest of us.

My chief thanks, however, must go to the noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, whose reply was, as usual, comprehensive. We shall all study what she said with great care, I think she clarified some important points. Naturally, I was particularly pleased that the noble Baroness seemed to be taking the long-term view and to be saying that the Government would seek to gain the real co-operation of industry in this vital partnership. I shall study her remarks on those points with particular care.

It has been an interesting and important debate. I hope that it will be seen to contribute to the new emphasis that the Government wish to place on science and technology and may therefore be regarded as a contribution to work in progress. I commend the Motion to the House.

On Question, Motion agreed to.