Merck Research Site

Debate between Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Markham

Thursday 11th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

There is no doubt that Brexit had an effect on the entire sector. It also had an effect on academia and led to us ending up with a very much reduced income from the Horizon Europe programme. There was a significant effect there. It is true that NHS uptake of new medicines as a percentage of the total has decreased; that decrease started somewhere around 2014-15 and has been relentless since. That has been part of creating an environment that is not conducive, and part of why, as part of the Life Sciences Sector Plan, we are determined to support R&D, company formation and growth and to make sure that the NHS is an adopter of innovation.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

Unfortunately, contrary to the bigger picture just painted by the Minister, the actual picture is one of a 50% decline in investment in life sciences in the past few years, the loss of three major investments—AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly and Merck—and the fact that 35% of the newest drugs available on the continent are no longer available or not being made available in the UK. The unfortunate situation is that the Treasury is looking at this only as a saving to the NHS and is not considering the wider impact on drugs for patients, valuable UK jobs and the life sciences industry. Has the Treasury performed a cost-benefit analysis that looks at all the costs to industry, patients and business versus the NHS savings? If yes, will the Minister commit to publishing it? If not, will he commit to commissioning one as soon as possible before we lose any more jobs?

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for that question. It is a point I agree with: this is about the overall economic picture as well as the health costs. It is something that we need to look at as we think about the way medicines are used in this country. I think that the macroeconomic picture is different from the simple health economics picture, and it is something that is an active part of discussion. It is something I have discussed with macroeconomists, looking at ways in which we might think about introducing that as part of the system.

European Framework Programme 10

Debate between Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Markham

Thursday 4th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I am going to have to get somebody else to answer that question in writing, I am afraid, because I do not know the answer.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

My Lords, I think we would all agree that the UK has most of the leading universities and institutions in Europe. The result, as the Minister said, is that historically we punched well above our weight in this area. We contributed only 12% of the funds and received 14% to 15% of the funds back; now, in the latest round, we are still contributing 12% and receiving only around 10% to 11%, so we are now punching well below our weight. What can we do to address this now and in future rounds to make sure that our universities are not losing out?

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

As I have said, we are actually above 13% for Pillar 1 in the university sector and we are increasing again. We took a big hit when we left—a very big hit—and it is taking a while to come back. We are now on track and doing better in increasing our share than any other nation in Europe. The biggest area on which to concentrate is the industry side. Industry took a big hit because of loss of confidence when we removed from the system, and that is going to take a little longer to come back.

Civil Service: Artificial Intelligence Productivity Gains

Debate between Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Markham

Monday 1st September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I agree, and I have alluded to that in previous answers. The challenge is a cultural one around workflow. I go back to the MIT report, which shows that, especially in big companies, there are high levels of adoption and low levels of disruption. The challenge is to get high levels of adoption with appropriate disruption taking place. That is a cultural challenge. That is why not only training but leadership are needed to make this happen.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

My Lords, we are all aware that probably the biggest challenge in government is productivity in the NHS, which has declined by about 20% since the pandemic. However, in none of the conversations and negotiations on the resident doctors’ dispute have we heard about productivity being a key part of the solution. Can the Minister reassure us that we really are trying to drive productivity gains, so that any wage increases can be fully justified?

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord. I can certainly reassure him that AI in the health service is going to be one of the big areas where changes occur. It is going to introduce changes in a number of ways. The first is in workflow organisation, which is key for the NHS to look at. The second is in new treatments and ways of diagnosing. It is already being used to reduce the need for humans to look at X-rays and so on to get them through more quickly, so there is an efficiency gain. There are also new approaches, such as using AI to make sure that remote monitoring—for example, taking photographs of suspicious moles and seeing if they are malignant—is potentially massively enhanced. There are many opportunities for productivity improvement through AI.

Science and Innovation: Alan Turing Institute

Debate between Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Markham

Monday 19th May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness. I wonder whether she read the piece I wrote, which said something very similar. I agree entirely that this has to be inclusive innovation and that it is not about two shiny objects at the end of the line—Oxford and Cambridge—but about the corridor in its entirety. It absolutely needs to involve all the local partners in making this happen. At the end of it, it needs to improve opportunities and the economics for everybody.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I am sure the Minister would agree that, if we are to continue to be the tech superpower, we need regulatory clarity, institutional continuity and competitive energy costs. Does he therefore share our concern that, in all three areas, we are losing ground?

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I agree that those areas are important. They are, of course, part of the system, including other matters such as procurement of innovation and the skills we need. On the regulatory side, the Regulatory Innovation Office is there to try to free the obstructions that exist to some innovation. The need to reduce reliance on gas and increase our ability to have a domestic supply is crucial to get energy prices to the right place. All these things are important. It is not just the initial science; it is the ability to turn that into companies that can subsequently scale.

Data (Use and Access) Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Markham

Report stage
Tuesday 21st January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

Like the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, I am not going to try to better the excellent speech made by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville.

We debated at much length in Committee the definition of the scientific interest, as it will dictate the breadth of the consent exemption for the data reused. If it is too broad, it could allow data companies—I am thinking specifically of AI programs—to justify data scraping without obtaining consent, should they successfully argue that it constitutes scientific research. However, should we create too narrow a definition, we could stifle commercial research and innovation. This would be disastrous for economic growth and the UK science and technology sector, which is one of our most dynamic sectors and has the potential to become one of the most profitable. We should be looking to support and grow, not hinder. Finding the happy medium here is no small feat, but the amendment tabled by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, goes a long way towards achieving this by threading the needle.

By requiring the research to be in the public interest to qualify for the consent exemption for data reuse, we will prevent companies cloaking purely commercial activities for their own ends in the guise of scientific research, while allowing commercial research which will benefit the general public.

This particularly chimes with my time as Health Minister, when we tried to ensure that we could bring the public with us on the use of their health data. We did a lot of focus groups on all of this, and we found that we could have very widespread—70%-plus—public support if we could demonstrate that there really was a medical research benefit from all of this. This amendment is very much in keeping with that. As I say, it threads the needle. That is why we will be strongly supporting the amendment tabled by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, and we hope he is minded to put the matter to a Division.

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, for his amendment and his engagement on this matter. I fully agree with the importance of ensuring that the term “scientific research” is not abused. Clause 67 will help avoid the misuse of the term by introducing a test of whether the research could reasonably be described as scientific. By explicitly requiring a reasonableness test, which is a well-known part of law, the provision is narrowing not broadening the current position.

Online Safety

Debate between Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Markham

Thursday 16th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

My understanding of this is that the Online Safety Act applies to all small companies and nobody is exempt. The things that would not apply would be the specific things in category 1, or indeed in category 2A and 2B, which are to do with the ability to apply and monitor a service contract, and the ability to ensure that users can exempt themselves from seeing certain activities. Those would not apply, but everything else does apply, including all the force of the Act in terms of the application to illegal content and the priority harms that have been identified.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I must admit that, probably like many noble Lords, I had to do a bit of research into 8chan and the others as part of this. In fact, I got a bit worried that I might get into trouble doing it on House of Lords servers. What I saw was that, before 8chan, there was 2chan and then 4chan, and 8chan is now 8kun. It is like whack-a-mole: while we can try to do all the technical moves, it is very difficult. So, coming at it from the other end of the telescope, the user end, I think we have done a lot of good things about getting messaging out about anti-fraud and I wonder whether there are things we can learn from that, to educate and equip young people, teachers and parents so that they are aware, and attacking it from that end as well.

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I hope the noble Lord does not get caught out from his search terms. Of course, he is absolutely right that part of this is about education and making people aware of what is there. I suspect that, as this gets introduced over the course of this year and enforcement starts, awareness will rise, and it will be incredibly important to include education as well.

Specialised Research Units: Closures

Debate between Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Markham

Monday 28th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

Universities have been under pressure, as the noble Lord knows, for a number of reasons, including student fees, overseas student numbers and questions about the full economic costs of research in addition to inflation. These are all important areas that will need to be looked at. It is worth remembering that, over the years, roughly one MRC unit per year has closed and a new one has started. This process is part of that continuing change, which I believe is important to make sure that we stay at the cutting edge. As part of that, the staff on the new wards will be fully paid. The principal investigator salary is the one that will have to be picked up in part by a host institution or by other grants coming in to provide support.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

Given the well-known fact that every £1 of government investment generates a return of £3 to £4 to the UK economy, does the Minister agree that any move to reduce government R&D spend or to close specialist research centres would be an act of economic self-harm, in direct contradiction to the Government’s claim to prioritise economic growth?

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

The noble Lord will be unsurprised that I am a strong supporter of R&D funding and know the importance of its links to economic growth. It is crucial that we look at the spread of R&D funding. It is the case that it will be necessary, from time to time, to shut some things and open new things—that has always been the case—otherwise things become ossified and you never end up with new programmes. I fully expect there to be a continued pattern of renewed support for some areas and a closing down of others. What is important in the context of this particular scheme is that the same proportion of MRC funding will be spent on these new centres as was spent on the old units and centres.

Horizon Europe

Debate between Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Markham

Tuesday 8th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

The noble Lord is quite right that the numbers are looking more promising for 2024, particularly in the European Research Council mono-beneficiary schemes. In the collaborative and industry schemes, things still look fairly flat, although there are some examples of very good progress. In the European rail project, 61% in the most recent round had a UK participant and five out of the seven successful bids had UK participants, so there is some progress. We are doing a number of things: there is an increased communications campaign, the last one having led to a substantial increase of 64,000 hits on the UK Horizon website; there are roadshows, most recently in Birmingham and Glasgow and soon in Northern Ireland and Wales; there are pump priming grants, which have led to an ability to get money to work out how to make applications to Horizon programmes—I am pleased to say that of those people who received those grants and put in applications, 100% were eligible. Finally, European network programmes are being set up to link UK academic teams and industry to European teams in the most successful countries.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I also welcome the Minister to answering his first Question—I know what it feels like. Following on from the last question, obviously we want to maximise participation and I am pleased to hear that the roadshow that we introduced is continuing to be rolled out. Are there particular sectors that we need to focus on in the outreach? I hear that the SME sector is particularly underrepresented.

[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.