Science, innovation and technology Committee
Debate between Chi Onwurah and Judith Cummins(1 month, 2 weeks ago)
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Dame Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West) (Lab)
I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for allocating time for this statement from the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee on our report, “Science diplomacy: Sovereignty, strategy and the global race”. I am pleased to see members of the Committee in the Chamber. I want to put on record my thanks to the Committee Clerks and specialists who have supported this inquiry, as well as the many witnesses who gave evidence.
I may have mentioned before that I am proud to be a chartered engineer with over 20 years of experience in industry, and for 16 years, I have been an engineer in the House, but as my friends, family and perhaps too many of my colleagues will attest, I am not a diplomat. In chairing this inquiry, I have learned much about the essential work of our diplomatic service and the international work of so many organisations and institutions, from the Royal Society to our armed forces. I thank them for their contribution. We found—the football analogy I am about to use was in the report even before England’s amazing win over Mexico—that the UK is in the premier league when it comes to scientific strengths and our global diplomatic network, but we do not know where we stand when it comes to science diplomacy. We launched our inquiry in April last year to examine how the UK Government should leverage scientific research and innovation to support its diplomatic goals, growth missions and national security. We held five public sessions and received over 50 written submissions. As the topic is so broad, we chose to look at the issues through three lenses: health and life sciences, quantum, and space. We also chose to focus on the UK Government’s strategy for science diplomacy, and its implications for sovereignty and research security, as part of the wider topic.
First of all, we found that the UK has failed to adapt to the pace of geopolitics. The geopolitical landscape has been turned upside down in recent years. Alongside rapid technological advancement, this has made science diplomacy more important than ever. I will give three quick examples to illustrate this. First, the global talent fund was the UK’s attempt to capitalise on the US retreat from science funding, but as it does not address the huge up-front costs faced by researchers, it is unlikely to have the impact that the Government desired. As of June this year, just 18 researchers had been announced as taking up new roles through the fund. That is not going to move any dials.
Secondly, while the Committee recognises that overseas development assistance spending has been reduced to allow the defence budget to be increased, our report highlights the short-sighted nature of some of the cuts that followed, and the impact on ODA for research and development.
Thirdly, the UK-US pharmaceutical agreement has secured benefits—notably, exemptions from tariffs—but it also appears to have involved significant commitments affecting core elements of UK domestic policy. Although the global nature of the pharmaceuticals sector means that trade negotiations will inevitably have an impact on it, surely decisions about NHS spending, pricing and access to medicines should primarily be driven by the needs of UK patients, and balanced with the sustainability of the life sciences sector.
Our second key finding was that there is a lack of overarching strategy. Witnesses consistently cited the strengths of the UK’s research base. Though we have less than 1% of the worldwide population, we have 6% of global publications and receive one 12th of global citations. We found that the Government have not articulated a coherent strategic framework for science diplomacy, despite those strengths. Such a framework should set out priority partners and technologies, and the intended outcomes of partnerships.
For the six frontier technologies in the digital and technologies sector plan, and for space, the Government should bring forward detailed cross-governmental strategies, accompanied by clear delivery plans. The forthcoming plan for space provides an important opportunity to do that. The report also describes the Government’s approach to international scientific agreements and science diplomacy as “opportunistic”.
Thirdly, we found that in a geopolitical landscape that, as I said, has been turned upside down, the UK is in a global race for sovereign capability, whether it acknowledges it or not. The US’s decision to ban foreigners’ access to Anthropic’s most powerful artificial intelligence models was a watershed moment that proved—to mix metaphors, perhaps—that there is actually a kill switch. The Government must reflect on this when considering our ambitions for secure sovereign capability.
Although the own-collaborate-access framework provides a useful foundation for prioritising the UK’s approaches to critical technology, it is applied at too high a level to actually influence and guide decision making. There are so many definitions of “sovereignty” circulating. That impedes our ability to give our international stakeholders clear signals, and prevents businesses from getting the signals that they need to apply their resources—skills, investment, research and development—to the technologies that the Government will procure on a sovereign basis.
The UK is highly successful at generating world-leading research and innovation, but less so in turning that strength into the growth of high-tech domestic companies. Too many UK-developed technologies are forced to look abroad to scale. The private sector needs clearer investment signals. Yesterday at the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee’s evidence session, the Secretary of State emphasised frontier models, computer chips and compute as parts of the AI tech stacks that she would like to have sovereign capability in. We need more clarity like that.
To finish, we have four areas of recommendation. On global policy, our report calls on the Government to strengthen the UK’s international science and technology position through a clearer strategy, greater investment and improved resilience. On strategy, we call on the Government to publish a coherent science diplomacy strategy, with clear criteria for decisions on science partnerships, and with explicit strategies for engagement with the US and the EU, Commonwealth partners, other middle powers and competitors such as Russia and China. On sovereignty, the Government should define what “technological sovereignty” means when it comes to critical technologies and particularly AI, identify key dependencies in supply chains, and use that analysis to guide investment and procurement decisions. To support innovation, we recommend improving scale-up capital, expanding specialist investment funds and using public procurement more strategically to help UK technology firms grow. Finally, on research security, and with the recent Biobank leak in mind, our report calls for stronger research security guidance, improved information sharing between Government and institutions such as universities, and a cross-Government plan to develop a sustainable domestic skills pipeline in critical scientific and technological fields.
The UK’s excellence in research and innovation is a distinct strategic advantage. To sustain it, we urge the Government to outline a science diplomacy strategy. Through such a strategy, we can ensure that science diplomacy remains a driver of progress, as well as a pillar of soft power.
Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)
I start by thanking the Chair of the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee and its entire membership for the publication of a very interesting and timely report. Business, academia and the whole tech sector needs clarity, in some ways more than anything else. Does the Chair share my concerns, which are stated quite well in the report, that
“The government has repeatedly outlined that building sovereign capability is a ‘critical priority’ for the UK but has not been clear on exactly what this means or how it might be measured”?
There are lots of different definitions of sovereignty being bandied around, which mean lots of different things in different contexts. Does the hon. Lady agree that we need some clarity on what exactly it means in this sector when we use the word “sovereignty”?
Modernisation Committee Report: Access to the House of Commons
Debate between Chi Onwurah and Judith Cummins(4 months, 1 week ago)
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Dame Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. On Tuesday evening, in the midst of a succession of votes, the technology supporting the world’s oldest continuous Parliament failed. I thank the Clerks and support staff for their speedy response and the quick transition to the old paper system, and the Whips for the effective communication. The Microsoft technology that runs our electronic voting system did not communicate effectively and displayed the message, “Cannot connect to essential module” or something similar. Despite successive reboots and the window of doom, that was all we could get out of it.
Madam Deputy Speaker, can we expect a report on the reasons for the failure, whether Microsoft provided speedy and appropriate support, how resilient the technology is and whether other providers are available? The failure was time consuming for Members, but more importantly it reduced confidence in the democratic process.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)
I thank the hon. Member for notice of her point of order. The issue that caused the fault on the pass reader voting system on Tuesday was quickly identified by the Parliamentary Digital Service later that evening and rectified. PDS and other House officials are now looking at the lessons learned from the incident and what additional resilience measures can be put in place to support the voting system. I put on record my thanks to all House officials involved for quickly facilitating the paper Division system on Tuesday so that proceedings could continue with minimal delay.
Technology in Public Services
Debate between Chi Onwurah and Judith Cummins(1 year, 11 months ago)
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Chi Onwurah
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that intervention, and for highlighting the lack of progress by the last Conservative Government—and indeed their failure to roll out acceptable digital infrastructure across our country.
Good news stories about technology have been replaced by tech horror stories—about workers imprisoned unfairly because of Post Office software failures, and about students being treated unfairly by exam algorithms. This entrenches opposition to technology. Too many of my constituents feel that they are being tracked, monitored, surveilled and analysed. They do not want to go online without feeling safe and secure.
Work by the Collective Intelligence Project highlights that safety, participation and progress must go hand in hand, because only public confidence in AI will enable us to drive adoption in public services and improve productivity. That is why the Government are so right to emphasise safe deployment. Pre-deployment evaluation of foundation models by our world-leading AI Safety Institute will boost public confidence, and provide transparency about when AI is used in the public sector, and how it will help to maintain trust.
I have worked in technology deployment for many years, and bitter experience has led me to the conclusion that whatever the problem might be, technology is not the answer on its own. You cannot force technology on people. Co-creation is an overused term but an underused reality, so engagement, participation and partnership working need to be part of the plans for adoption. The group Connected by Data has great examples of this type of participatory decision making. Camden Council, which was led until recently by the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Queen’s Park and Maida Vale (Georgia Gould), has done excellent work in this regard.
I am sure that I do not need to tell the House that AI is the subject of hype as well as hope. In partnership with the What Works centres, we need to evaluate different uses of AI in our hospitals and schools, for example, so that we can scale up the most cost-effective solutions while avoiding expensive failures. The private sector has driven the adoption of so many of the technologies that have transformed our lives, but we must build state capacity in tech by recruiting more diverse science and technology experts to the civil service, so that Government can innovate. We need fair, open and transparent procurement processes that will enable British start-ups as well as big tech companies to bid for Government contracts.
Given the previous Government’s responses to my parliamentary questions, I am concerned that our digital infrastructure may be too dependent on single or dual suppliers, or on proprietary systems. I hope that the Secretary of State will consider that, and the role of start-ups and open source in ensuring resilience. Digital inclusion was neglected by the previous Government. Age UK estimates that around a third of over-75s—that is 1.7 million people—do not use the internet. We must tackle the barriers, which include infrastructure availability, cost and the skills gap, but we also need to recognise that some people may never be comfortable with digital access to Government services.
Finally, we should remember that we too are a public service. I have raised the adoption of technology in this place many times. Indeed, I worked closely with the House authorities during covid to deliver a remote Parliament by introducing Zoom into the Commons. We must lead by example when it comes to adopting technology to improve our performance. I am standing to be Chair of the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee because this is so important to all our constituents, but they often feel that technology is something that is done to them, rather than with them and for them. The benefits of technology have not been shared fairly. Under a Labour Government, this will change, and public services will lead the way.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)
I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, Layla Moran.
Reforms to NHS Dentistry
Debate between Chi Onwurah and Judith Cummins(3 years, 4 months ago)
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Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered progress on reforms to NHS dentistry.
I thank the Backbench Business Committee for once again granting this important debate, and my co-sponsor, the hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous), for all his work in helping to secure it.
When preparing for the debate, I thought it was useful to consider and reflect on the foundations of our NHS in the Beveridge report, which was published 80 years ago last November. Although it would be an understatement to say that the world has changed since its publication, the identity of this country is still proudly centred around our national health service—an idea so powerfully contained in the pages of the report. For the great British social reformers of the 20th century, dentistry was not some Cinderella service of secondary importance. Beveridge concluded that no one could seriously doubt that a free dental service should become as universal as a free medical service. Eighty years after the report’s publication, it is time that the House reaffirmed our commitment to universal dental care in this country.
It is worth noting that the Beveridge report, in its proposition for universal access to NHS dentistry, was published by a multi-party coalition Government. As I stand here today, Members on both sides of the Chamber will agree that the crisis in NHS dentistry deserves the same cross-party attention that it was afforded 80 years ago, because the system has decayed: access has fallen to an historic low, and inaction over the past 13 years has caused untold damage. There can be no more half measures or excuses. Now is the time to establish a new preventive dental contract that is fit for the 21st century.
The words of my campaigning over the past eight years now serve as a compendium of forecasting doom. In 2016, I warned of a mounting crisis and drew the Government’s attention to a digital report warning that half of dentists were thinking of leaving the profession. Between 2017 and 2019, I warned that 60% of dentists were planning to leave NHS dentistry. In 2020, after years of repeated warnings, I once again informed the Government that 58% of the UK’s remaining dentists were planning on moving away from NHS dentistry within five years. The Government once again fudged and ignored, and more than 1,000 dentists left the NHS.
This NHS dental crisis has been a devastating slow-motion car crash of the Government’s own making, yet year after year, Minister after Minister, they have assured me of their commitment to reform. Last year, when I pressed the Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, the hon. Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield), for action on this matter, she informed me that she had started work on a dental contract reform. However, just yesterday, we became aware that after 13 years in power, the Government are once again starting with an announcement of a plan to publish a new plan to improve access to NHS dentistry—a plan for a plan.
We would all welcome further clarification on what that plan might involve. I can only hope that sustained campaigning on this issue by me and other Members will mean that the plan will result in positive change for my Bradford South constituents.
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this excellent and incredibly important debate. In Newcastle, where NHS dentistry access has become almost impossible for so many of my constituents, a whole generation of young people and children are growing up without access to an NHS dentist. Does she agree that that is causing immense suffering now and storing up not only pain and suffering but additional costs for the future?
Judith Cummins
My hon. Friend makes an important point. I will specifically cover access to NHS dentistry for children later in my remarks.
On the Government’s plan for a plan, experience suggests that positive change for my constituents may well be wishful thinking. My constituents are suffering and take no solace whatever from the Government’s commitment to plan for a plan for reform. The contract has been in place since 2006, and the Government have been undertaking a review of the process since 2011. After 12 years, it is still a work in progress.