Cuts and budget delays are undermining UK science sector, warns Labour
The government risks creating a serious funding gap for science, Labour has warned, saying that delays over budgets and cuts to research are undermining the sector and giving the lie to ministers’ boasts about Britain’s status as a science superpower.
The party has highlighted a continued standoff over post-Brexit funding for collaboration with European scientists via the Horizon research programme, as well as the lack of an agreed budget for the main government science funding scheme, saying the government risked “badly letting down” the sector.
The government is currently creating a “blue skies” science research agency, modelled on the Advanced Research Projects Agency (Arpa) in the US, a project heavily promoted by Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s former aide.
While Labour says it backs the plan for the Advanced Research and Invention Agency (Aria), Ed Miliband, the shadow business secretary, warned that it risked being undermined by a lack of certainty in other areas.
Giving evidence to the Commons science committee last week, the business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, appearing after Cummings, was asked about funding for Horizon. He replied that this was still “a subject of the conversations”.
Kwarteng was also asked why UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), a semi-attached public body linked to his department that has a key role in funding and other scientific areas, still had no agreed budget a matter of weeks before the new financial year. He replied that there was “unprecedented pressure on budgets, and we are in the process of trying to get a good settlement for UKRI”.
UKRI has already announced that its budget for international development projects has been cut from £245m to £125m, the result of the government’s decision to reduce its international aid budget from 0.7% of gross national income to 0.5%, bringing criticism from a number of scientists.
Labour has argued for a guaranteed 3% of GDP to be spent on science and research and for Aria to have a defined mandate and to not be exempted from freedom of information requests.
Miliband said: “Nothing has illustrated more clearly the importance of scientific research than the current Covid-19 crisis. But now, with just days left until the start of the financial year, the government has failed to provide the UK’s science community with certainty about its funding.
“Already, more than £100m has been raided from the science budget because of cuts to overseas development funding. And there is an even bigger threat to the science budget if it is used to fund the government’s contribution to the Horizon programme.
“Despite their rhetoric on wanting the UK to be a science superpower, the government risks badly letting down our scientists.”
A spokeswoman for the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy said the government was “committed to strengthening the UK’s world-class reputation for research and innovation”, pointing to the £800m committed to Aria.
They added: “We are working with our delivery partners, including UK Research and Innovation, to implement a new research and development settlement for 2021/22 that protects the most effective research programmes, including our participation in Horizon Europe.”