Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Willetts Excerpts

Thursday 7th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

9. What support his Department is providing to the life sciences sector.

[The Minister for Universities and Science (Mr David Willetts)]

Our life sciences strategy, launched by the Prime Minister, has already triggered more than £1 billion of business investment in life sciences. That is good for growth and good for the NHS.

[David Rutley]

As my right hon. Friend is aware, Macclesfield and north-east Cheshire are well known for their strong base in life sciences skills and the economic contribution of companies such as AstraZeneca. In the light of that, what further steps is he taking to encourage investment in the north-west, and in north-east Cheshire in particular?

[Mr Willetts]

I pay tribute to the work of my hon. Friend, and I recall visiting the AstraZeneca facility at Alderley park with him last year. There is a very strong life sciences cluster in the north-west. We are supporting it with extra investment in the new Manchester cancer research centre and in the Manchester collaborative centre for information research.

[Stephen Metcalfe]

At a recent meeting of the Science and Technology Committee, Professor Dame Sally Davies, the Government’s chief medical officer, talked about the increasing amount of antibiotic resistance in disease and stated that

“the apocalyptic scenario is that when I need a new hip in 20 years I’ll die from a routine infection because we’ve run out of antibiotics.”

Will the Minister therefore tell the House what steps the Government are taking to fix what some have described as the “broken pipeline” in the development of new drugs?

[Mr Willetts]

I have heard Dame Sally Davies speak eloquently about that challenge, which is why the Secretary of State for Health will, I understand, be launching an action plan on that particular issue in the spring. What we are doing in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills is backing investment and ensuring a pipeline of new drugs for the future. That is what the patent box is about, it is what research and development tax credits are about and it is what the new biomedical catalyst is about. We can be confident of the support we are providing for medical research in the UK.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

I hope the Minister will forgive me for describing that answer of his as a tad complacent. The fact of the matter is that when we talk to leading academics and leading investors in business we find that they think that in life sciences we are lagging behind the other countries we are competing with—particularly China, but also many other places. They are worried that what will happen in life sciences is what is steadily happening in pharmaceuticals, whereby we are losing our pharmaceutical industry and it is switching overseas.

[Mr Willetts]

There is certainly a global race and I believe that the Government’s policies are securing us a strong position in it. We are not complacent, but the improvements in the tax relief, the protection for medical research and the innovations taking products closer to market ensure that when companies look around Europe it is clear to them that Britain is the best place to locate their pharmaceutical activities.

[Mike Crockart (Edinburgh West) (LD)]

The Scottish life sciences sector is worth £3 billion to the economy and employs 32,000 people. Last week, Edinburgh’s BioQuarter announced that three new companies have just moved in. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, as we have already heard, the life sciences sector is about more than the golden triangle in the south-east of England?

[Mr Willetts]

That is absolutely right. As well as what is happening in the north-west of England, the Edinburgh BioQuarter is of international repute and the university of Dundee is the centre of another excellent cluster of medical research. This is a British strength, not simply a strength in the London-Oxford-Cambridge triangle.

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

4. What assessment he has made of the need for business certainty for firms to secure investment and long-term growth.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Universities and Science (Mr David Willetts)]

Our higher education reforms are increasing cash for teaching at our universities and delivering more choice for students. Higher applications this year are up by 3% and the proportion of 18-year-old applicants from the most disadvantaged backgrounds has increased to the highest level ever. Every English region has seen applications increase.

[Mr Thomas]

With £9,000 tuition fees, universities are seeing considerable variations in their student numbers—potentially up to 40% in some cases. What research has the Minister done into the reasons behind the 13% drop in student numbers last year?

[Mr Willetts]

The variation in applications between universities is what happens when there is competition and when the money goes with the student. That is a key feature of our reforms. This year we are seeing applications up. Given the hon. Gentleman’s genuine concern about this issue, I should have thought that he would welcome the fact that the application rate for disadvantaged young people from England is at its highest ever level—19.5%.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

May I congratulate the Minister on his excellent reforms and urge him to push forward with all the efforts that he is making to attract foreign students to the UK?

[Mr Willetts]

My hon. Friend is right. There is no cap on the number of overseas students who come to Britain. All legitimate overseas students are warmly welcome in our country.

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

Will the Minister acknowledge that both universities in my constituency, along with many others across the sector, have been negatively impacted by the ill-considered and hastily introduced student control measures last year? Will he recognise that he made a mistake by rushing into that and explain what he is going to do to mitigate the damage?

[Mr Willetts]

Let us be clear. The student control system that we inherited involved allocating a fixed number of student places to every university in England. We do not believe that that is the right way of ensuring competition and choice in our education. That is why we are introducing new flexibilities, so that universities that succeed in attracting more students can take on more students.

[Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)]

The Government are right to be encouraged by the fact that we have seen the highest ever number of applicants this year from Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the EU and outside the EU, and the third highest ever from England, particularly from disadvantaged backgrounds. Will Ministers continue to focus on those from disadvantaged backgrounds and on young men, of whom there appear to be relatively smaller numbers of applicants, compared with young women? I am sure we need both to feel encouraged to go to universities in equal measure.

[Mr Willetts]

My right hon. Friend is right and I pay tribute to his efforts in this area. Clearly, we must not be complacent. There is always more to do, and I hope that in all parts of the House we can agree that we must communicate the crucial message that no student has to pay up front to go to university; they pay back only if they are graduates in well paid employment.

[Andrew Stephenson (Pendle) (Con)]

6. What assessment he has made of the effect of the regional growth fund on job creation in the north-west.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)]

T9. My right hon. Friend will be aware of the growing funding problems for postgraduate students. Most have to pay large sums up front, borrowing from banks or their families if they are rich enough, which creates huge social mobility problems. Has he had a chance to look at the proposals in my policy paper, “Developing a future: Policies for science and research”, or, indeed, the very similar proposals from the Higher Education Commission and the National Union of Students?

[The Minister for Universities and Science (Mr David Willetts)]

Postgraduate education is very important. We have maintained funding for it through the Higher Education Funding Council for England, but I am following with great interest the imaginative ideas being brought forward and we are open-minded if people have proposals for increasing access to borrowing and finance for postgraduates.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

In an earlier question, on the privatisation of Royal Mail, the Minister deliberately referred to the fact that shares would be sold off to the people in Royal Mail. It almost harks back to the “share-owning democracy” of Mrs Thatcher, when she privatised all the public utilities and almost without exception those public utilities—E.ON, EDF and all the rest—are now owned by Germany, France, Spain and even further afield. That is what happens to share-owning democracies. Instead of gazing into crystal balls, read the history!

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Mosley (City of Chester) (Con)]

There will be no swearing in my question.

My right hon. Friend the Minister for Universities will be aware of Chester university’s great success in getting industrial support. The vice-chancellor, Professor Tim Wheeler, the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller) and I all have a free spot in our diaries on 1 March. I was wondering whether my right hon. Friend would come and join the celebrations with us.

[Mr Willetts]

I very much hope to join that event. I hope to be up there that day. If not, I will be there on another occasion, because I am a great admirer of what has been achieved at the university of Chester.

[John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State imagine that the counterfeiters, the smugglers and the others will welcome the introduction of plain packaging for the tobacco industry?

--- Later in debate ---

[Jonathan Reynolds (Stalybridge and Hyde) (Lab/Co-op)]

There are concerns that the UK is lagging behind its competitors in the registration of graphene patents. The USA has more than 1,100; we have just 46. Does the Minister agree that this is an example of why the Government need to provide more strategic direction and to support important technology sectors for the future?

[Mr Willetts]

We have, of course, invested more than £60 million in graphene research, notably, but not only, in Manchester. I have seen that evidence from patents. It is a reminder of the importance of ensuring that we are absolutely out there supporting the commercialisation of graphene, and that is what we are committed to doing.

[Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

I congratulate the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) on taking the Groceries Code Adjudicator Bill through Parliament, and on allowing the adjudicator to impose fines. Will she look favourably on the adjudicator taking their own initiative in investigations from day one?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Willetts]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. These reforms increase resources for universities. They are not putting off students from less affluent backgrounds and it is graduates, not students, who pay. That is a very fair and progressive way of financing higher education.

[Mr William Bain (Glasgow North East) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State agree that, if the United Kingdom stayed in the European Union and completed the single European market, our growth could increase by 7% within a decade, but that if we left the EU and had a relationship with it such as that of Norway or Switzerland, our exports could be as much as 14 times lower over the same period?