Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies

Lord Krebs Excerpts

Tuesday 28th April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan]

As I said earlier, SAGE does not have a specific membership. The people attending SAGE vary depending on the subjects under discussion; something like 100 participants in total can be called on. BEIS holds a central list of appropriate experts in the different sciences, academia and industry. They are brought into particular meetings when their expertise is required, and that is the call of the Chief Medical Officer and the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser.

[Lord Krebs (CB)]

My Lords, as the Minister will be aware, the process of providing scientific advice is set out in the Government’s chief scientist guidelines. Three key principles of these guidelines are: an open and transparent approach; a full acknowledgement of uncertainty; and to draw on a wide range of expert advice. What is the Minister’s assessment of how well these guidelines are being applied during the Covid-19 epidemic?

[Lord Callanan]

The Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser is confident that the role of SAGE is clear, that the business is conducted in an appropriately transparent and open manner, that the group is scientifically rigorous —having, as I said, more than 100 scientists ultimately feeding into it—and that it is totally independent of political interference.