Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Johnson of Marylebone and Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard

Tuesday 28th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Joseph Johnson]

This Government, more than any other, understand the importance of science funding. That is why we have protected science spending until the end of the Parliament—a decade of real-terms protection. Our universities and institutes can continue today to apply for EU competitive funding streams under Horizon 2020, and I am sure they will continue to be successful in the future.[Official Report, 5 July 2016, Vol. 612, c. 4MC.]

[Tom Elliott (Fermanagh and South Tyrone) (UUP)]

I praise the Catapult programme run by the Department, but can the Minister give us any indication of the opportunities for it to be rolled out more widely and to be available to people in areas such as Northern Ireland?

[Joseph Johnson]

Certainly. In our manifesto we committed to rolling out our very successful catapult network, which provides shared facilities that companies, on their own, could not afford to construct. That enables our businesses to maximise the value of research coming out of our university system. In this Parliament, we have already delivered new catapults at Alderley Park in Cheshire and in Cambridge, with the precision medicine catapult. This is an expanding and very successful network, and it will continue to be so.