Horizon Europe
Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Vallance of Balham(1 month, 2 weeks ago)
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Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for his question. He is right that the SME sector is underrepresented, and there is a specific effort to increase its ability to engage and to raise awareness within it. We hope that will be a major part of the European networking programme as well.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
My Lords, can the noble Lord give us an estimate of the damage done to our research and development programmes through our absence from the Horizon scheme over the past few years?
Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)
There is absolutely no doubt that quite significant damage was done. That the participation rate dropped so dramatically, from 16% of all grants coming to the UK in 2015 to 6.5% in 2022, shows the scale of the damage. At the moment, it is not possible to work that out in terms of patents or publications, partly because those indicators are so lagging, but we will look at that and I fully expect to see some change.