Science and Research
Debate between Paul Blomfield and Andrew Smith(8 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Andrew Smith (Oxford East) (Lab)
I warmly congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. Does he agree that the situation is all the more perverse given that for the research investment that is made—particularly significantly through universities—we get more bang for our buck than other countries in citations and innovation, and therefore that if we put in more bucks we would get more bangs?
Paul Blomfield
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that intervention, and he makes a point that I will come back to and reflect on shortly.
The drop in our publicly funded research to 0.5% of GDP takes that research to its lowest point for more than 20 years. The latest figures, published by UNESCO in March, put the UK’s publicly funded research at 0.48% of GDP, which is well below the EU average of 0.67%, the OECD average of 0.71% and the G8 average of 0.77%.