John Denham - Science funding
Royal Academy of Engineering, London - 29 April 2008

Check against delivery

Thank you for coming this morning. I'm grateful to the Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering for hosting us today.

In December I was able to confirm a 17.4% increase in the science budget over the next three years. A significant, year-on-year, real increase in funding at a time of tight public spending.

It was - and is - good news.

It continues a period of unprecedented peacetime growth in science funding.

A period in which the strength of British science has been clear for all to see.

• Our science is the most productive and efficient in the G8.
• With 1% of the world's population, we carry out 4.5% of the world's research and claim 8% of scientific publications.
• We are second only to the US in research output.

And, over and above the investment we've made, the Government has recognised - more clearly than at any time since the 1960s - the importance of science and innovation to our future prosperity and success.

In speeches I made in the USA last week, I set out how the UK's research base and international collaboration in science, are central to our future prosperity and success.

Yet as we all know, the past few months have seen a rumbling controversy about parts of the science budget. Controversy that has centred on two disciplines but which has - at times - spilled over into a public challenge to the system of peer review; calls for ministers to intervene in detailed funding decisions; claims by the opposition that civil servants now determine 20% of research funding; and criticism both of the move towards full funding of research institutions and the promotion of thematic, cross-disciplinary research.

We are in danger of giving the wrong impression about our research base to the international scientific community; to the world's mobile R&D investors; and to our own young people.

So it is timely to re-state our commitment to fundamental science; and to set out the proper responsibilities of ministers and of scientists.

My case is very clear. As a government we have fought for, and won, record resources. We will continue to argue the case for fundamental and applied research. As ministers, we will take only those strategic decisions which, in the modern world, have to be the responsibility of government. Beyond that, it is for the research community itself - research councils and researchers - to set priorities and to distribute funds.

I hope by making that case to reach a position where we can move forward together.

Finding solutions to the problems that will inevitably arise from time to time, but essentially working together to promote British science and its achievements.

In saying this, I look forward to tomorrow's publication of the select committee report on the science allocations. As the only Cabinet member to have chaired a select committee, I treat them with respect; and we will respond properly and after careful consideration to their conclusions.

I should make it clear that the timing of this speech - and indeed its contents - were determined before the select committee set a publication date. This is not and should not be taken as a response to their report.

Fundamental science

I've just come back from a week in the USA, looking in detail at the success of their innovation clusters in Boston and North Carolina. These are places that set the international benchmark for turning basic research into commercial products.

These clusters are complex systems, with many elements to their success.

But wherever I went, whoever I talked to - not just scientists but entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and intellectual property lawyers - I was told that the cornerstone of success is the quality of fundamental research.

Fundamental research that must be pursued - systematically - over many years.

I think I've made a clear commitment to basic research on many occasions. But let me do so again.

Of course the Government is interested on the successful exploitation of research. And we should expect our research community and institutions to be alive and open to the possibilities of doing so. Fundamental science, its application, and fruitful innovation are all part of a continuum.

But there is no short cut to successful exploitation which simply starves basic research in favour of its application.

It is, so often, the research driven by sheer intellectual curiosity that turns out to be the source of ideas with practical application.

Take, for example, the work of Greg Winter in Cambridge. His team pioneered the techniques to humanise monoclonal antibodies, removing the adverse reactions experienced by some patients. He then went on to found a number of spin-out companies which pioneered antibody engineering.

This process is inherently unpredictable. No one could have foreseen that the drive to understand that fundamental nature of matter could have thrown up the computing challenge for which Tim Berners-Lee developed the World Wide Web.

So while I and my department will work hard to ensure that we do not pass up any opportunity to exploit knowledge, we will also be making the case - with you - for sustained investment in fundamental research itself. The move to full economic costing is very much part of that.

We cannot predict the scientific breakthroughs of tomorrow. Which is why we need to maintain a large volume and wide breadth of fundamental research.

But we can never do everything. Difficult choices have to be made.

Let me acknowledge some of these, and let me try to set out how I think such decisions should be taken.

Making science decisions

For many years, the British government has been guided by the Haldane principle - that detailed decisions on how research money is spent are for the science community to make through the research councils.

Our basis for funding research is also enshrined in the Science and Technology Act of 1965, which gives the Secretary of State power to direct the research councils - and, in practice, respects the spirit of the Haldane principle.

In practice, of course, Haldane has been interpreted to a greater or lesser extent over the years, not least when Ted Heath transferred a quarter of research council funding to government departments - a move undone by Margaret Thatcher.

But in the 21st century, I think three fundamental elements remain entirely valid.

• That researchers are best placed to determine detailed priorities.
• That the government's role is to set the over-arching strategy; and
• That the research councils are "guardians of the independence of science".

These should be the basis for Haldane today, and over the decades to come, and I am happy to re-state them.

But recent debates have thrown up questions about each of those principles. How researchers determine priorities? How ministers set strategy, and how research councils play their vital role.

Peer review

I can quite understand how those whose work is not funded may well question those who gave it a lower priority. Particularly when, as will so often be the case in a scientifically strong nation, rejected research proposals are themselves of real scientific quality.

I know that RCUK recently looked at the detail of how peer review operates, and is considering how to improve the process.

But it is hard to conceive of an alternative that does not shift the responsibility away from scientists themselves. I was impressed by the US system of innovation. I was much less comfortable with the way in which the success or failure of quite detailed lines of research can be determined by political lobbying.

Those of my political colleagues - from all parties - who have urged me to intervene in detailed decisions need to recognise that that would be the start of a very slippery slope. None of us should go down it.

Strategic priorities

1. Big projects

But of course, ministers do get involved in large and strategic decisions.

The reality is that without ministers' involvement, research would not be supported on a sustainable basis through full economic costing. The relationship between fundamental and translational research would be unclear. Major scientific facilities would not get built.

There are amusing accounts of one Cabinet Committee during the Thatcher Government which was debating further investment in CERN. Apparently, Mrs Thatcher allowed her more lickspittle ministers to believe that she would see this as an extravagant, socialistic and - above all - foreign project. They duly took this line before she revealed that, while it was very expensive, it was also very interesting.

Today, major commitments like the UK Medical Research and Innovation Centre in Camden - costing perhaps £0.5 billion - simply cannot get off the ground without active ministerial involvement across many government departments. The same is true of the international science and innovation centres being developed at Harwell and at Daresbury.

Of course, such commitments, like CERN itself, could be seen as constraining or pre-empting other parts of the research council programmes. But, in truth, if Britain is to be a big player in big science, major, strategic and sustained investment will always be needed.

2. Cross-cutting themes

Some have expressed similar reservations about the four thematic research council programmes - on lifelong health and wellbeing, energy, living with environmental change, and global threats to security.

But, not withstanding everything I have said about the unpredictability of basic research, there is an increasingly widespread recognition that time is running out to mobilise our resources to tackle some of the most pressing threats to sustainability and security.

The challenges of climate change, of food security, of water supply, and the risk of new conflict impose real timetables on the search for solutions.

Within a growing budget, a proper focus on these challenges is essential and it must be right that government is able to harness scientific expertise. I believe, too, that it forms a key part of our public case for research investment.

The thematic programmes give a focus and a cross-disciplinary emphasis to part of the research councils' budget. But within those programmes, the majority of the work funded will, of course, be in response mode.

And here too, the scope, definition and allocation of spending is still determined by the Research Councils.

3. Responding to problems

I and the science minister, Ian Pearson, have tried to remain pretty hands-off. (I won't pretend we did not intervene to ensure that the Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering received a slightly larger stipend for international fellowships than officials had proposed, but I hope this won't be the subject of too much criticism here.)

Occasionally, however, issues have arisen that require something much less than intervention in individual decisions but rather more than doing nothing.

When we accepted the scientific advice not to proceed at this time with the fourth generation light sources, it obviously raised questions about the future development of Daresbury - an important national science and innovation priority.

That's why we invited Sir Tom McKillop to extend his work with the North West Development Agency to advise on its future development and why we worked with the STFC to ensure he had the scope to do so.

Similarly, when it became clear how the STFC priorities might affect two areas of physics grants, I initiated the process which led to Bill Wakeham being asked to review the health of the discipline. Again, I'm grateful to the STFC for working to ensure that no precipitate decisions on grant funding are taken before Bill reports.

In due course, RCUK will carry out a series of similar reviews of individual disciplines. This will be of real value to the science community and also to ministers. Reflecting on the events of recent months, I think there may be scope to improve the quality of strategic advice and analysis available to ministers before the overall allocation and thematic funding decisions are made. Certainly, while change is unavoidable, it is important to be able to anticipate the direction and pace of change

As most of you will know, Professor Adrian Smith will be joining us as the new Director General of Science and Research in September. I will wait for him to get his feet under the table, but he knows I will be keen to discuss ways in which we could draw more directly on strategic insights from the science community.

Communicating science

A second reflection concerns the importance of communications with the science community.

In reality, communications are generally pretty good. All research councils have had to manage difficult choices, and it is a credit to the entire research community that there has not been more public dissension.

Nonetheless, I think that most of us would recognise that, in some key areas, the timely provision of detailed information and impact analysis might have assuaged some of the fears that have recently been expressed, and allowed others to be debated in a different way. This is, I think, another area, to examine for the future.

At the end of the day, though, it is important that we all own this process of setting scientific priorities.

And that we can all give more attention to celebrating success and communicating your achievements.

Bad news attracts headlines; we have to work much harder on the good ones.

A young generation still needs to be inspired. Our international collaborators need to be attracted.

And we have, frankly, bigger fish to fry.

The heated but scarcely illuminating debate about embryonic research shows how scientists needs to turn their voices outwards, to engage with and inform the public on these complex and ethical issues.

Only last week, London papers ran stories on a new "killer disease lab" - this turned out to be UK Centre for Medical Research and Innovation, with its state-of-the-art scientific facilities and access to teaching and specialist hospitals. Its breakthroughs in the treatment of viruses, bacterial diseases and cancer will be trialled and adopted by the NHS to the benefit of millions of people.

All this reduced to "new killer disease lab".

We have a better story than this to tell, and should tell it with confidence.

In closing, I would like us to agree collectively that:

• Fundamental research will remain a major priority.
• That we will seek to reap every possible benefit from our excellent research base.
• And that, together, we should promote British science both at home and abroad.

We must:

• Sing the praises of research.
• Demonstrate its contribution to our national well-being.
• And inspire the scientists and researchers of the future.

Thank you.