Science, Research and Innovation will be at the heart of our Industrial Strategy and this Government has bold ambitions to increase R&D and back industries of the future. Our vision to reach R&D investment of 2.4% of GDP within ten years and 3% in the longer-term is part of this.

The Government clearly demonstrated its commitment to science and research in the 2016 Autumn Statement, committing an additional £4.7 billion to R&D funding covering both science and innovation over the period 2017/18 to 2020/21. This equates to an extra £2 billion a year by 2020/21, the biggest increase in any parliament since 1979.

Due to the financial situation we inherited, we are of course forced to review all BIS spend—as all Departments are reviewing their spend. As our manifesto made clear, the Government are committed to continuing to ensure that we have a stable and sustainable funding regime for our universities and higher education institutions. They are secure and financially stable, and we will continue to ensure a fair balance of interests between taxpayers and students.

The number of girls taking separate science GCSEs increased between 2010 and 2013 from 53,000 to 74,800 (41%) in biology, from 51,400 to 73,600 (43%) in chemistry and from 50,700 to 73,200 (44%) in physics. Girls now make up approximately 49% of all those taking each of the separate sciences, compared to approximately 45% in 2010.

The Government is committed to increasing take-up of separate science GCSEs, including increasing the proportion of girls as part of its commitment to improve overall take up of STEM subjects at A level and beyond.

The “Your Life” Campaign, launched in May 2014, brings together business, educators, civil society and Government to show how science and mathematics leads to exciting, successful careers. This will include a publicity campaign aimed at 14 to 16-year-olds, which will aim to change the way they think about science-based subjects from boring, specialist and niche to empowering, exciting, enabling and for everyone.

We are funding the Triple Science Support Programme to provide intensive support to schools with either no take-up or relatively low take-up of all three separate science GCSEs, and more general support to all other schools. We are also funding the Stimulating Physics Network to increase progression to physics A level, especially of girls. Much of the work the network does focuses on improving engagement and interest of pupils in physics at GCSE.

Excellent teaching is vital and we are offering bursaries worth up to £20,000 and teacher training scholarships worth £25,000 to recruit more specialist science teachers. We are also funding up to 50 local science learning partnerships to provide CPD for existing science teachers.

The Department for Business Innovation and Skills funds the STEM Ambassadors programme, a nationwide network of over 27,000 volunteers from industry and academia, 40% of whom are women, who work with schools across the UK to raise awareness of the range of careers that STEM qualifications can offer.

A number of academic studies find a positive link between research and development (R&D) investment and economic growth. Much of the relevant evidence was set out in a recent report for BIS "Insights from international benchmarking of the UK science and innovation system¹" and the 2014 BIS Innovation Report².

A further recent UK report estimated that public investment in science yields a social rate of return of around 20%, through its impact on private sector productivity³. This means that for every £1 spent by Government on R&D, private sector output rises by 20 pence per year in perpetuity. This effect could be larger where additional public spending on R&D attracts additional private R&D spending. The same report and other studies have shown that there is a "crowding-in" effect of public investment on R&D. The effect is greater in industries that conduct significant R&D or collaborate with universities.¹

Available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/science-and-innovation-system-international-benchmarking²

Available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/innovation-report-2014-innovation-research-and-growth³ Available at:

http://sciencecampaign.org.uk/UKScienceBase.pdf

The information requested for each local authority area could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills reassesses Government expenditure on science and research during each spending review. The most recent published allocations can be found in the booklet ‘The Allocation of Science and Research Funding 2011-12 to 2014-15’ (20 December 2010):

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/allocation-of-science-and-research-funding-2011-12-to-2014-15

The Department has also announced additional allocations since the 2010 spending review through fiscal events of over £1.5 billion, and has in the 2013 spending review also announced a long-term commitment to provide £1.1 billion of science capital funding, rising with inflation, to 2021.

Every two years, BIS commissions a report on the ‘International Comparative Performance of the UK Research Base’, which benchmarks UK performance against key competitor countries on inputs- and outputs-related metrics. The last report, published in December, found that while the UK as a whole spent less on R&D as share of GDP than most comparator countries, it produced the highest quality research. Notably, it pointed out that with 0.9% of the world population, 3.2% of R&D expenditure and 4.1% of researchers, the UK accounted for 6.4% of publications, 11.6% of citations and 15.9% of highly-cited publications.

The Department published allocations for the periods concerned in the booklet "The Allocation of Science and Research Funding 2011-12 to 2014-15" (20 December 2010):

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/allocation-of-science-and-research-funding-2011-12-to-2014-15

The Department has also announced additional allocations since the spending review through fiscal events totalling £514 million in 2013-14 and £609 million in 2014-15. This figure includes resource for projects announced at the autumn statement, 5 December 2013, Official Report, columns 1101-1113.

The outturn for each financial year is published in the Public Expenditure Outturn White Paper and the BIS annual accounts, available on:

www.gov.uk

after the end of each financial year.