Brexit: The Erasmus and Horizon Programmes (European Union Committee Report)

Lord Best Excerpts

Monday 1st April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I speak as a member of the EU Home Affairs Sub-Committee, but I do not intend to add further commentary on the contents of this, our latest report. That task has been performed admirably by our excellent chair and by other noble Lords. Instead, I offer a couple of thoughts about the process behind the report.

I am relatively new to the sub-committee and this is its first report during my tenure. Two things have struck me forcefully. The first is what an extraordinary resource this committee represents—like, I have no doubt, your Lordships’ other EU committees, as demonstrated this afternoon in the debate on Brexit: The Customs Challenge. Our sub-committee contains people with extensive experience of European matters, from the very highest levels of the Diplomatic Service, and from membership of the European Parliament and of bodies working with the EU who understand its strengths and weaknesses. For those who do not like to be guided by experts, the committee has wise and experienced members from all the main political parties and from the independent Cross Benches.

Our report is the culmination of an exercise that has brought together the foremost participants in the field to give us high-quality evidence, along with our quizzing of Government Ministers and officials, and the input of our exceptional staff team. This is a thorough, highly civilised and effective mechanism for achieving a unanimous outcome across party divides and between those with considerable specialist knowledge and those with more general wisdom and experience.

My first observation, therefore, is that this country—amid all the chaos and confusion of Brexit—has an incredible resource in the House of Lords EU committees: a means of bringing clarity to complex issues, of achieving both understanding and consensus, and of bringing more light than heat to the debate.

However, my second observation is that this resource is largely ignored: this voice of reason is largely unheard even within Parliament, let alone in the world outside. The report on the Erasmus and Horizon programmes before us tonight is no exception. Despite its clear analysis and really important recommendations, members of the general public are unlikely to see or hear its contents.

How many people know how valuable the Erasmus programmes are for tens of thousands of young people in this country or how important to the UK’s research and innovation is our involvement with the Horizon programmes? How many people know that currently we gain financially from these programmes and are net beneficiaries, getting more out than we put in— £3 billion in, £5 billion out, as the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, said? How many people know that Brexit, with or without a deal, means that, even if we pour in a lot more taxpayers’ money—and the figures are in billions, not millions—we will still lose our influential, key position in the decision-making for these funding programmes?

Despite a sprinkling of media coverage of our report and some modest pieces in academic magazines and journals, it is likely that the committee’s work will go more or less unnoticed. I think this a great shame. The report before us tonight exemplifies the clear, constructive, consensus-based role that this House can play through its EU Committee and sub-committees in guiding the nation on significant aspects of the UK’s relationship with the EU. But it also illustrates how, surrounded by noise and dissent, this rational, evidence-based approach can be ignored. This is a waste of what should be a brilliant gift to the policymakers and practitioners.

As any research council, policy think tank or research-based foundation will testify, producing a fine report is the start, not the end, of a process for achieving change. It requires persistence to get the message out with a clear communications strategy, ongoing participation in conferences, seminars and informal sessions with opinion-formers, targeting of the news media and use of online social networks. Reports do no good gathering dust on library shelves.

At this time of fake news and divisive discourse, I would like to think that the House’s budget for disseminating and publicising the outputs from our committees—such as the excellent report we are debating tonight—might be significantly increased. However, in the meantime, it is an urgent necessity that the Government recognise that the committee’s vital report on the Erasmus and Horizon programmes deserves their most positive consideration.