Life Sciences Businesses Debate
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Lord Fox
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Life Sciences Businesses
Lord Fox Excerpts(9 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Lord Johnson of Lainston (Con)
The noble Lord is absolutely right to raise this as a core issue. I am quite frustrated myself at some of our planning points, which certainly delay the building of these essential facilities. I am glad that life sciences wet lab space has been coming on stream in significant quantities, not least recently in Canary Wharf, which I hope he will join me in celebrating. However, there is more to be done; I totally agree with the noble Lord.
Lord Fox (LD)
My Lords, the Office for Life Sciences reports to the DHSC and the DSIT. The Office for Investment is a joint No. 10 and Department for Business and Trade unit. I spoke to a major biotech investor in this country, which said that the lack of communication between these two organisations is hampering its progress in building new biotech capacity in this country. Does the Minister agree that these two organisations ought to work closely together? There ought to be an explicit link, so that when companies are trying to scale up and invest in this country there is a proper joined-up approach.