Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment his Department has made of the implications for its policies of Nesta’s report entitled The Missing 4 Billion, published 27 May 2020.

Government considered a range of evidence and analysis in developing the R&D measures in the Levelling Up White Paper, including Nesta’s ‘The Mission £4bn’ report.

The Levelling White Paper sets out a series of measures to ensure that R&D supports levelling up across the country. Public investment in R&D outside the Greater South East will increase by at least one third over the Spending Review period and at least 40 percent by 2030. This additional government funding will seek to leverage at least twice as much private sector investment over the long term to stimulate innovation and productivity growth.

Supporting delivery of this goal, BEIS will make levelling up one of the objectives of its R&D investment strategy and will aim for the regions outside the Greater South East to receive at least 55% of its R&D budget by 2024/25.

Alongside increasing investment in innovation across the country, BEIS will invest £100m between 2022-3 and 2024-5 to pilot three new Innovation Accelerators centred on Greater Manchester, the West Midlands and Glasgow City-Region. Innovation Accelerators will develop UK innovation clusters, boosting economic growth by investing in high-quality projects to grow R&D strengths, attract private investment, boost innovation diffusion, and maximise the combined economic impact of R&D institutions.