Exiting the EU: Science and Research

Carol Monaghan Excerpts

Monday 19th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)]

I will not attempt to follow that. My goose would be roasted.

I declare an interest as both a scientist and an EU national—I hold an Irish passport. As such, I feel strongly about what is happening during the debate. Brexit makes no sense for many of us, but it goes against all normal rules for the scientific community and threatens a key activity that is central to their work. Scientists do not see a person’s nationality, class or ethnicity. They see only a mind and a personality. If that mind is brilliant, and if that person has a contribution to make and a part to play, they are part of the community.

We have heard arguments describing the importance of science and its impact on our economy. We have heard about the importance of continued or enhanced funding for science, and we know how important international collaborations are for science excellence. The Minister spoke of the importance of the space sector, but the UK’s continued participation in projects such as the Galileo programme is under serious threat. Galileo is the EU’s answer to the US-based global positioning system—Galileo is needed because the US can block GPS access in times of conflict, and Europe needs an independent system it can rely on. The UK could now be frozen out of both systems, which is a dangerous possibility.

The single most important element in ensuring that we continue to maintain the UK’s position as a science superpower is protecting and valuing the people who make UK science so impressive. I was delighted to welcome to Parliament a fortnight ago Professor Anton Muscatelli, the principal of Glasgow University. He provided us with some interesting statistics. He told us that 20% of the teaching staff and 50% of the research staff at Glasgow were EU nationals. There are two different types of staff. We have the typically young 20-something postgraduate or post-doctoral researcher, who is less likely to have family ties that would make it difficult for some to leave and go elsewhere. They are a highly mobile group of people who have chosen the institution because of its speciality. However, by the nature of science, many other institutions in Europe will have expertise in similar areas.

The next group of staff is more established—they would hold senior research or lecturer positions, and would be in charge of large projects or teams. They may well have family ties that make it difficult for them to leave. Both groups have doubts over their futures. The UK Government might well say that nothing will change for them in the short term, but I keep hearing about the requirement for other EU states to offer reciprocal arrangements for UK citizens.

These scientists are some of the very best minds in the world. They are the very people enabling the UK to maintain its position at the forefront of world science. They contribute to the UK economy—in Scotland we know our world-class academic sector of 19 universities creates an annual economic impact of £7.2 billion. Those people are being compared to non-economically active pensioners living in Spain. How insulting is that to those top scientists—to be used as bargaining chips in negotiations on rights to remain? Which of us would hang about where we are not wanted? My own husband, an engineer, is an EU national. His 17 years of service in the UK armed forces have been reduced to details of his place of birth.

Thankfully, in Scotland the First Minister has made robust statements on the importance of our EU nationals, and has thanked them for choosing to make Scotland their home. But we need similarly strong leadership on this from the UK Government. We need the assurances called for in the recent report on leaving the EU by the Science and Technology Committee. That report’s recommendations, which have already been highlighted, include an immediate commitment to exempt EU researchers already working here from any wider potential immigration controls. But we need to go further. We should be looking to exempt any researcher with the required skills, whether or not they are already resident in the UK. If we do not offer such assurances, plenty of countries are ready to snap those scientists up.

I move on now to the subject of EU students. There is the potential for a serious impact on the higher education sector if we are not clear about their immigration and fees status post Brexit. Again, that represents a potential lost funding stream. In its submission to the Science and Technology Committee the University of Liverpool stated that if it had no new EU students coming to study, by 2018-19 its loss of fee income would be £6.2 million. In Scotland, EU students contribute massively to the local economy and increase the diversity and improve the student experience for all involved in higher education. Indeed, the financial loss is only one aspect, and we need to consider how we will protect the talent streams that come from the EU. In the UK we cannot currently fill our science, technology, engineering and maths courses with UK students. The EU students who come to study in our institutions provide future talent in areas of key shortages.

I therefore ask the Minister the following questions. What student recruitment strategies are being considered in key STEM areas, at home and abroad? What fee structures will be in place post Brexit—an attractive UK university will quickly become less attractive if EU students are asked to pay international student fees? Visa restrictions already pose major hurdles for non-EU scientists hoping to come to the UK for short study visits. What will happen post Brexit when an EU researcher hopes to collaborate with a UK group? We keep hearing that Brexit means Brexit, but does Brexit really mean that the UK’s international reputation for science should be threatened?

Leaving the EU presents major challenges for the future of UK science, but there is no science representative in the Brexit negotiations. Science must have a voice in any negotiations. The clock is ticking. We need action now to prevent fundamental and lasting damage. It is said that Albert Einstein said, “Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the universe”. The Government need not be infinitely stupid as they gamble with this most important area of the UK economy.

[Mr Peter Lilley (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan), with whom I agree on some aspects, in particular the importance of giving assurances to EU nationals in this country, whether scientists or not, that they can stay.

What the Minister and the shadow Minister have said about our universities is, if anything, an understatement. Our universities are every bit as good as has been said, and more. I would argue that they are too modest. They underestimate how attractive they are and will be as collaborators to universities not merely in the EU but throughout the world. They underestimate their ability to persuade their own Government of the importance of funding research, given that they have been successful in persuading EU institutions to fund that research. Given their success in attracting students from outside the EU, our universities also underestimate how successful they will be at continuing to attract students from within the EU once we are no longer a member. The universities have been too modest and too afraid of change. They should look forward positively to the opportunities that will open up when we are no longer in the EU.

Three issues have been raised. The first is money. The claim is that 10% of publicly funded UK research and development comes from the EU. That is a grossly misleading figure. During the referendum campaign there was much debate about the use of gross figures for our contribution to the EU rather than net ones. For instance, the gross figure of £350 million a week on the side of the leave bus was criticised. I always used the net figure, and we now know from the Office for Budget Responsibility that the net amount we will get back when we are no longer members of the EU will be £250 million a week. But anyone who criticised the £350 million figure should be equally critical of those who quote the gross receipts from the EU without netting off our contributions to it—the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) mentioned those contributions. With the Horizon programme, we should not be talking about the gross figure of £8.8 billion but the net figure of £3.4 billion over the period 2007 to 2013, which was of the order of half a billion a year. I will come back to that quite significant figure.

Overall, we are net contributors to the EU to the tune of more than £13 billion a year—again, that is from the OBR figures. It should therefore not be too difficult for our universities to argue for the continuation of the money they currently receive from the EU directly from the Treasury, instead of indirectly via the EU, because the Treasury will be £13 billion better off after meeting all the commitments currently funded from EU funds.

I come now to collaboration. It is obviously important that we continue to provide opportunities for UK researchers to collaborate with high-calibre researchers not just in the EU but across the world. Our universities and researchers are of such high calibre that they will be in demand as partners and should be given opportunities to work with partners from across the world.

If there are barriers to collaboration with researchers in north America, Asia, Australasia and Latin America, I would like to know about them. I constantly hear of and meet researchers from those countries in the UK. If we look out the figures, it turns out that alongside the 32,000 EU citizens working as academics in the UK we have 21,000 from non-EU countries. There does not seem to be too much difficulty in getting researchers and academics from outside the EU. If there are such problems, why have I never been lobbied by the universities to overcome the problems of bringing in citizens from non-EU countries? Do they not like Americans, Latin Americans and Asians? Do they prefer Europeans? Should we not be seeking opportunities worldwide, and not narrowly in the EU?

[Carol Monaghan]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Lilley]

I am afraid it has been hinted that I should make progress rather than take interventions.

If there are such difficulties, let us overcome them and make sure they do not apply to EU academics in future.

On student numbers, Universities UK talks about increased barriers to recruiting EU students. I understand there are some 115,000 EU students in the UK. They are entitled to loans from the British taxpayer, and to the right to stay and work after they cease studying. By contrast, our universities are spectacularly more successful in recruiting students from outside the EU, even though those students pay the full cost of their education and effectively help to subsidise all the other students, British and European, at university. Their rights to remain and work in the UK are more restricted. When we introduced full fees for foreign university students, the universities claimed that that would make it impossible for them to recruit from abroad. Happily, they were wrong—spectacularly wrong. I have no doubt that they will be equally wrong about their ability to continue to recruit EU students once we are no longer a member of the EU. The EU countries are closer and richer than many of the countries from which we recruit students who pay full fees.

When assessing the costs and benefits, we ought to take into account the cost to this country at present of giving loans to EU students, which are, inevitably, much more difficult to get back when they have left. Indeed, the official figures show that only 16% of EU students are currently repaying the loans they have received from the British taxpayer. [Interruption.] I do not know what the figures are, but I will venture some so that people can knock them down and come back with better ones. Supposing that 60% of the students—[Interruption.] Would the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) like to intervene if he has a funny point to make? [Interruption.] No, we do not have any facts or figures; I am trying to elicit them. There are 115,000 students. I do not know how many of them have loans. Let us say that 60% take out loans. If only 16% repay them, that means it would cost the British taxpayer over £500 million a year to subsidise EU students. I hope that the Minister or Opposition Members can tell us the sum is less than that, but perhaps they are not interested. Perhaps they like dishing out British taxpayers’ money without calculating how much is at stake and for whom.

Universities are also rightly worried about whether immigration controls will impinge on our ability to recruit students from the EU. They have reiterated their demand that student numbers be excluded from the immigration figures. That is a somewhat disingenuous request—it is not what they really want. If students return to their home country after they have studied here, their net contribution to the net immigration figure is zero. What universities mean, therefore, is not that they want the figures excluded, but that the limitations on students’ right to remain be lifted. They want to, as it were, sell university places by offering the added benefit of being able to get around our immigration controls. They want that in the present for those coming from outside the EU, and they want to maintain it in future for those coming from the EU when we are no longer a member.

That is not the right way to approach the issue. We should, of course, have immigration rules that allow us to recruit students from abroad but ensure that they return later, and that allow us to recruit academics from abroad, as we do at present, without creating added difficulties. If we have sensible and affordable policies to continue our funding and to recruit from abroad, which we ought to be able to do, and we do not impose any new restrictions on recruiting academics, the opportunities for British universities will be far greater than they imagine. I urge them to put their excessive modesty behind them, set aside their fear of change and embrace the opportunities that Brexit will give them.