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Science Budget

I shall talk about delivery plans in a moment—[Interruption.] What I can say in response to the hon. Gentleman is that, through our officials, the Government want to work closely with the research councils. That level of communication is exactly what hon. Members would expect, but it is ultimately up to the research councils to make detailed decisions on projects. It is simply not right for the Government to interfere in those detailed decisions, and we do not do so. I should like briefly to talk about the detailed draft delivery plan process. The rationale was to ensure that each council undertook a rigorous prioritisation process. We did not wish to second-guess or take decisions for the research councils. We wanted to ensure that a robust process was followed. The STFC has been referred to by many hon. Members this evening, and the first thing that I want to do is acknowledge the concerns that have been expressed in the particle physics and astronomy community about the science budget allocations. Those concerns were reflected in the Select Committee's report. Hon. Members will be aware that, last Thursday, the STFC announced the results of a programmatic review. It will be holding a meeting tomorrow at which the outcome will be discussed with scientists themselves. The Department considered that the final delivery plan drawn up by the STFC, following the receipt of its allocation in October 2007, raised two strategic issues that merited further independent advice. That is why we asked Sir Tom McKillop to extend his work with the Northwest Regional Development Agency to advise on the future development of the Daresbury campus, and asked Research Councils UK to initiate a review of the health of physics as a whole, given the interest of a number of research councils in this subject. People sometimes forget that physics is funded by a number of the research councils, to the tune of more than £500 million a year at the moment—and that is on a rising profile over the CSR period. The Government are working with the STFC to review the way in which its allocation was handled, and to ensure that all the relevant lessons are learned for the future. In particular, the STFC has recognised that it could have communicated its plans better, and it is taking steps to address that. The STFC will take account of these lessons as it takes forward the organisational review, which will cover strategy and planning, customer and stakeholder engagement, governance and risk-management processes, delivery, value for money and the management of change. Before I conclude, I should like to respond to some of the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Blackley on science policy. We have a clear 10-year framework that provides a statement on the Government's science policy. We say very clearly that public funding of research is dedicated to supporting excellence, irrespective of its UK location. That policy remains firmly in place. My response to him is that investment in the development of Daresbury—to which I am very committed—and Harwell will take place on the basis of their being world-class campuses for science and innovation, not on the basis of their geographic location. He will be aware that I have a long-standing interest in regional policy, and I hope that we will have the opportunity to discuss science cities and clusters. My hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, North (Dr. Gibson) mentioned his desire to develop Norwich as a science cluster. There is great potential there, and it is a subject on which we can have further discussions. It being Ten o'clock, Mr. Speaker proceeded to put forthwith the deferred Questions relating to Estimates which he was directed to put at that hour, pursuant to Standing Order No. 54 (Consideration of estimates)