Government Political Priorities and Legislative Agenda

Lord Eatwell Excerpts

Thursday 3rd September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Eatwell (Lab)]

My Lords, economic growth is the Government’s prime objective. Growth provides the resources to fund all our national goals, from health to the police; from defence to a fair distribution of income. Central to the growth objective is investment. Rachel Reeves laid the foundations for a growing economy with a 12% increase in public investment this year, but on that foundation must be built a programme of increasing investment in science and technology—the inventive core of a competitive economy.

Reflecting on the underlying strengths of Britain, politicians invariably cite our outstanding research universities, yet we now have daily reports of the financial difficulties being experienced by the university sector. We can debate the origins of those difficulties, but that is to look backwards. Looking forwards, we must ensure that the research universities thrive. They are Britain’s number one strength. That is why it was particularly distressing to learn on 9 July of the substantial cuts that are to be made to scientific research. By 2030, spending by the Science and Technology Facilities Council is to be cut by 15% in money terms, not even allowing for inflation. Research potentially impacted includes work on new cancer treatments and battery design.

The national research laboratories face the tightest squeeze: their funding is to fall by over half. Those are the national labs that developed radar, the computer and high-strength carbon fibre. The touch screen of your mobile phone was invented at a British national research lab—the Royal Radar Establishment. The national labs undertake research that would never be done in the private sector because the risks and uncertainties are too great, and the initial market often non-existent. Yet discoveries in those labs, often by serendipity, have changed the world.

Some research may, at first sight, appear irrelevant in the light of our economic problems—research in theoretical physics, for example—but that is a serious misconception. Consider, for example, the caesium atomic clock. Experimental physics developed at one of our national labs is now the basis of the timing of the internet and global navigation systems. Consider X-ray crystallography, a highly specialised branch of physics concerned with the arrangement of atoms. This technique now underpins genetic engineering, biotechnology and modern pharmaceuticals. More generally, consider the fact that, for years, this country’s finest mathematicians have worked on number theory, proving that the series of prime numbers is infinite, worrying about the minimum distance between primes, and so on. Totally abstract—yet, with the advent of digital computing, number theory is fundamental to all secure programming, including the programming of your mobile phone.

If Britain is to rediscover its competitive strength, we must not reduce our commitment to science. We must not lose our lead in research areas. The 9 July cuts are a signal of the nation’s faltering commitment to industrial strength. I trust that in his speech scheduled for Monday, the Chancellor will be able to assure the country that the new Government will reverse the cuts of 9 July.