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Liaison Committee: Third Report

My Lords, I declare my interests as the chairman of the Science and Technology Committee and as a career scientist. As the chairman of the Liaison Committee said, my amendment refers to paragraphs 18 and 47 of the committee's report, which include the proposal to reduce the resources of the Science and Technology Committee to those of a single committee from the present level of a Select Committee and a sub-committee. Although the report is not specific, my reading is that it will, in effect, halve the number of inquiries that the committee is able to carry out. This does not seem to square with the Leader of the House's letter to Cross-Benchers in which he refers to a small reduction in resource to the Science and Technology Select Committee. My amendment is important because it gets to the heart of what the House does best—using its great depth and breadth of expertise to investigate and to hold the Government to account. This House is unique in the world in its depth of scientific expertise. The Goodlad report of April 2011, of which we heard earlier, acknowledged, "““the clear public interest in making best use of the expertise of the House's Members””." Science in its broadest sense—included social science, medicine, engineering and technology—permeates almost every aspect of government policy. This is notably true of the all-important agenda of rebalancing the economy by developing new industries based on advanced knowledge and technology. The Science and Technology Committee not only has great depth of expertise but great breadth in its coverage. I will list just a few examples of areas that we have covered in recent years. They include policies related to education, innovation and economic growth, energy supply, treatment of infectious diseases, ageing—a topic of particular interest to many of us—internet security, preservation of our heritage, and disposal of waste. The reports of the Select Committee also have significant impact. To name just one recent example, our report on the future of nuclear energy resulted in a substantial change in the Government's approach. If the lights stay on in 15 years' time, we should thank the Science and Technology Committee for its work. Our reports not only have the stamp of authority within government but are highly respected and admired in the wider world. I will quote Mark Henderson of the Times, who wrote of our report on genomic medicine, published two or three years ago, that it was, "““a quite remarkable summary of the state of the science and the steps the Government must take””." He went on to say: "““It is hard to imagine even a body like the US Senate producing a report of quite this quality and authority ... There's a reason why this report is so good: it was compiled by a committee of people with genuine experience and understanding of science””." To avoid misunderstanding, I should add that the committee is not just a club for scientists. It has an eclectic mix of Members, which enriches its deliberations and sharpens its recommendations. The Science and Technology Committee has a tradition of following up its reports, thus ensuring that its scrutiny is thorough and insistent. For example, our recent report on public procurement and innovation was very critical of the Government's approach to driving innovation in UK industry with its £230 billion annual procurement budget. The Government largely accepted our recommendations and we said that we would return to this topic soon to inquire whether the recommendations had been carried through. The ad hoc committees referred to by the noble Lord the chairman of the Liaison Committee will not have this capacity to follow through their inquiries and check that the Government have indeed acted on their recommendations. The Liaison Committee's proposal to reduce the resources of the Science and Technology Committee will do great reputational damage to this House. The presidents of four national academies—the Royal Society, the Academy of Medical Sciences, the Royal Academy of Engineering and the British Academy —wrote a joint letter to the Prime Minister expressing their concern about the Liaison Committee's proposal. I appreciate, of course, that the Liaison Committee has a difficult job. It wishes to create new ad hoc committees to inquire into new areas, and to enable a wider range of noble Lords to participate in committee work. It is trying to do this at a time of scarce resources. However, in allocating these resources it is essential to be very thorough in assessing value for money. Indeed, the report of the Liaison Committee refers to value for money in paragraph 8. I looked very carefully through the report to understand how this assessment of value for money was made but I was unsuccessful in finding any relevant analysis. The Science and Technology Committee, at its present level of support, represents excellent value for money. It uses the unique expertise of the House, it covers a very wide range of policy areas, and its reports have authority, impact and respect within government and more widely. It conducts follow-up inquiries to ensure that its recommendations have been acted on. I am not, however, simply defending the status quo. I made specific and constructive suggestions to the Liaison Committee to enable it to achieve its objective without damaging the work of the Science and Technology Committee. These suggestions, which included increasing our co-option of additional Members to embrace a wider variety of expertise from the House, and shortening the term of service of members of the committee, were not taken up in the report. I invite the noble Lord the Chairman, when he responds, to explain to the House how his committee carried out its assessment of value for money, and why it concluded that better value for money would be had from reducing the activity of a demonstrably successful, immensely valuable, high-reputation committee and creating new committees. I believe that any such analysis would support my amendment. Before I close—and I wish to be brief—I suggest to the noble Lord the chairman of the Liaison Committee that he takes this proposal back to the committee for further consideration. If he agreed to do so, that would be the basis for my withdrawing the amendment. Meanwhile, I beg to move.