Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Thursday 8th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

We are committed to postgraduate education in the UK, and of course we will continue to review the implications for it as our higher education reforms come through, but at the moment we are seeing an increase in the number of postgraduate students in the UK—a record of which we can be proud.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Eighteen months into a Government supposedly focused on growth, we finally have a paper focused on innovation—the engine of growth. We welcome it and will consider it carefully. However, we have seen that this Government’s fine words are not matched by action. The director of the CBI recently described their action on solar panels as the

“third smack about the head”

for investors in renewables. In China, the US, India, Germany and Finland Governments are taking action to create large-scale technological and market opportunities in renewables, ICT, pharma and nanotechnology. What real action will the Government take as a result of the report?

[Mr Willetts]

The report that we are publishing today is a list of the actions that we have already taken and the further actions that we are proposing to take. That includes technology innovation centres, including specific provision for renewables. It also includes the reintroduction of the Smart awards, which were run into the sand under the previous Government, and a research and development tax credit that will be worth more than £1 billion to companies large and small.