King’s Speech (4th Day)

Viscount Stansgate Excerpts

Monday 22nd July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

My Lords, I am very glad to contribute to today’s debate, although it is always a challenge to follow the formidable knowledge of the noble Lord, Lord Kakkar.

This is the first time I have spoken at the beginning of a new Parliament, and from this side of the House. Indeed, in this House, the rearrangement of the seating is the only definite proof that an election has in fact taken place. We now have a Government who have placed science and innovation at the very heart of their economic strategy, which is the subject of today’s debate. The appointment of my noble friend the Minister is the clearest evidence of the seriousness of this commitment. It is a wonderful appointment and he is a very welcome addition to this House. He joins a select group of Members whose maiden speech and first ministerial speech, which was excellent, turn out to be one and the same. I also hope the House will allow me to say that in a previous capacity, when for decades I organised many of the major events involving science and Parliament in the Palace of Westminster, he always took part in these events, no matter how busy he was—and as the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser, he was very busy. He made the time to talk to younger scientists and engineers and to encourage them in their careers and to take part in public life. I am sure he will continue to do so as a Minister.

I welcome the new language now being used to describe our future relationship with Europe on science, not just the progress being made on Horizon Europe, which was the subject of my first ever Oral Question, and such initiatives as greater youth mobility within Europe and our possible reintegration with the Erasmus scheme, but above all on re-establishing trust, so that the UK can be considered a reliable partner again when it comes to science and research.

I am sure the Minister will agree that as we develop renewable energy, the fact remains that the UK will still need strategic access to energy when it happens that the wind does not blow and the sun does not shine. We are going to need a strategic energy reserve. The Science and Technology Committee, of which I am a member, recently published our report Long-duration Energy Storage, and gave it the subtitle Get on with It. This was for a reason, because there is little time to lose. I hope the new Minister will be able to make progress and take advantage of any forthcoming changes in planning laws.

There are also new opportunities for the future that we simply must not miss, such as in engineering biology. It is a transformative technology, already acknowledged as one of the five critical technologies of the future, and I hope the House will have the opportunity to debate some of these exciting new opportunities in the future.

If the Government want science and innovation to pave the way for greater economic growth, it is going to require the greatest investment to unlock this potential. We need to reach the target R&D spend of our major competitor nations, alongside the development of a long-term industrial strategy that provides the stable framework for investment in science. As a country, we have a great reputation for scientific innovation yet, at the same time, a poor record for exploiting the innovation for the benefit of our economy, leaving it too often to other countries to exploit it commercially. In the decade of national renewal that lies ahead, I very much hope the Government and the new Minister of Science will succeed in reversing this dismal pattern. If we can dispense with the scientific phrase “valley of death” once and for all, that would be very good progress.

However, this is not just a debate about what the Government do. It is vital that Parliament has strong links with the science community outside the House, getting access to the widest range of advice as possible, and that Parliament fully supports the machinery that connects science to Parliament. A major part of this connection is the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee, which is by far Parliament’s oldest all-party parliamentary group; it dates back to 1939 when Parliament realised it needed to keep in active contact with the boffins—a term of endearment in those days—from whom much was expected and delivered in the Second World War.

Over the past 85 years, the P&SC has guided Parliament on science issues and helped to educate generations of parliamentarians on the importance of science, technology, engineering and innovation. I am its current president—there are no financial interests, but it is in the register—and with the defeat of our chair in the general election, I now have the responsibility of getting it restarted. If I may use Hansard as a publisher, I invite as many of my colleagues as possible, in this place and another place, to Committee Room 4A at 12 noon on Tuesday 30 July for the inaugural meeting. Without this meeting, all the work planned cannot go ahead. It is to Parliament’s benefit that it should have access to the widest possible science advice. I commend that approach to the House.