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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether the Government has made an assessment of future levels of research funding in the UK after the UK leaves the EU and existing projects have been completed.

The UK will maintain its status as a global centre for research and innovation. In last year’s Spending Review the Government committed to protecting science resource funding in real terms from its 2015-16 level of £4.7 billion a year for the rest of the parliament, as well as committing to invest in new scientific infrastructure on a record scale – £6.9 billion over the period 2015-2021.

While the UK remains a member of the EU, funding and collaboration arrangements continue unchanged. Researchers can continue to bid for competitive EU research funding such as Horizon 2020 while we remain a member of the EU. The Government will work with the Commission to ensure payment when funds are awarded. The Treasury will underwrite the payment of such awards, even when specific projects continue beyond the UK’s departure from the EU. Access to apply to Horizon 2020 and subsequent funding programmes after we leave the EU will be a matter for the negotiations that will follow the triggering of Article 50.