Advanced Research and Invention Agency Bill (First sitting)

Aaron Bell Excerpts

Wednesday 14th April 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Dawn Butler]

Q It was a quick one on why UKRI cannot access the innovators of tomorrow—the people coding at home. I did not understand what was stopping UKRI doing that?

Professor Leyser: At the moment, most of our funding opportunities require people to apply for a research grant. People coding at home have a hard time applying for research grants, because it is a system with financial checks and so on. Applying for a research grant is a non-trivial activity, whereas winning a research prize, where there is no application process and you just get on with it, is doable. We are very interested in that wider range of funding mechanisms and in how we can learn from the work of Nesta, and, in the future, the work of ARIA to reach a wider range of people. But at the moment, we work on a largely open-call process; it is really effective because it is completely open, but it none the less creates barriers for people who do not have the infrastructure and administrative support to help them submit those kinds of grant applications.

[Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con)]

Q It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I thank both witnesses for their time, and Dame Ottoline for her evidence to the Science and Technology Committee, on which Ms Butler and I also serve.

Following on from Dame Ottoline’s answer to Ms Butler, obviously, the purpose is to expand ARIA to cover areas that are not already well covered, but it also seems to be to try to pick up the pace of research and innovation. We have seen that that is possible through crises such as coronavirus. Can you explain how the pace can be picked up by some of the things that you do at Nesta and whether that would carry across to what ARIA is going to do?

Tris Dyson: I think it helps to pick things, to say, “We want to achieve x within the next two or three years” and to give people a degree of certainty about what outcomes you are going to fund and why. It happens naturally, anyway. Coronavirus is a crisis that has created a rush for R&D. It has also shown, on the drug development or vaccine side, what a combination of funding and relatively agile thinking, including from regulators in conjunction, can do in order to improve outcomes and achieve things. A challenge prize creates that in a positive sense; it essentially says, “We are going to solve for x and award funding on that basis.” That helps speed things up.

Related to the previous question, with a grant model approach, you are funding inputs and costs primarily. People put in a proposal for half a million pounds and say, “We are going to do x and this is what the associated costs are going to be.” Inherently, your risk threshold is going to be different, because you are anticipating whether this an investment that means they are going to be able to spend that money well and achieve x. You are going to look at track records, their financial history and their institutional strengths. You are going to make a judgment on whether to fund A versus B. That lends itself more towards funding the usual suspects than an outcome-based model, where you say, “It is not important to us who solves for x as long as somebody does.” In reality, you tend to blend these models. It is not like there is a pure challenge prize model that does not involve other types of funding mechanisms as well.

[Aaron Bell]

Understood, thank you. I had better hand on, as we are running out of time.

[Virginia Crosbie (Ynys Môn) (Con)]

Q It is a pleasure to serve on this Committee, particularly as a scientist. Dame Ottoline said one of the challenges was finding the right people to lead ARIA and that they were in short supply. Tris said that ARIA was about identifying visionary leaders with extraordinary ideas. My question to both of you is, how much is the success of ARIA linked to finding the right people to lead it? Are you confident that we can find them?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

I think we are going to hear your question, Aaron, but we will not get the reply.

[Aaron Bell]

Q Professor Bond, you said that opacity is useful because it avoids too much pressure being put on people. Does that apply to trying to get new people into the space?

Professor Bond: Sorry, when you say “new people”—

[Aaron Bell]

Q People we are trying to get in through the challenges and so on.

Professor Bond: Yes, I think so.

[The Chair]

Perfect. We have come to the end of the time allocated for the Committee to ask questions, and indeed for this morning’s sitting. I thank our witnesses on behalf of the Committee for their evidence. Professor James Wilsdon from the University of Sheffield, Professor Mariana Mazzucato from University College London and Professor Philip Bond from the University of Manchester, thank you very much indeed.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned. —(Michael Tomlinson.)