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Andrew Miller MP is to stand down from his Ellesmere Port and Neston constituency at the general election, but not before he has assessed the impact of his five-year stint as chair of the Commons science and technology committee – and decided what tips he can pass on to whoever takes on the role.
The government announced a £5.9 billion sustained investment in science in the Chancellor’s autumn statement, including £95 million to take the lead in the next European mission to Mars. More than £230 million will also go on a new science research centre called the Sir Henry Royce Institute in Manchester, and £20 million will go towards a research centre on ageing, in Newcastle.
Manufacturers’ organisation the EEF broadly welcomed the statement, which included measures designed to strengthen the R&D tax credits system and to cut tax on young apprentices. There will be extra funding for the High Value Manufacturing Catapult, viewed by Hermann Hauser, the technology entrepreneur who dreamt up the scheme, as one of its early success stories. The EEF warned, however, that a regime of “feast and famine” for innovation and science in the future would not be helpful.
“There are some serious challenges for science,” acknowledges Miller. “But there is now a bipartisan move recognising the importance of science and engineering in the government machinery. That is creating a more stable environment, and that, with protection of the core budget, has meant people are looking long-term, rather than the piecemeal approach of a short-term funding horizon.”
Miller says that small engineering firms in Germany have benefited from the relationship between the entrepreneur, the Fraunhofer research centres – models for the Catapults – and the banking sector, where bankers take advice from researchers before giving loans to technology companies, creating a “virtuous triangle”. He says that expanding a technology business in the UK is still “incredibly difficult”.
After the election, Miller hopes to leave a legacy to the MPs on the science committee of where it has succeeded in influencing policy – and where it might have done better.
“We are on track to do something a bit different,” he says. “The noises around the advanced manufacturing Catapult are really quite encouraging.”
“We will be looking at the recommendations we have made during my time on the committee, and whether they have had the desired effect,” says Miller. “We are trying to peer review our own work.”
He says one success story has been the work the government has carried out on how it handles scientific advice in emergencies. “That resulted in a significant shake-up of the Cabinet Office machinery.”
Miller says he has enjoyed working with engineers during his time on the committee, including a trip to look at “the most extraordinary engineering project on the planet – Cern”. It was in Geneva that Miller first proposed that the organisations that eventually were named Catapults be called Turing centres in honour of the mathematician and computer scientist Alan Turing. That recommendation was ultimately not adopted. But others of his and the committee’s may be. “I’ll be watching closely from outside parliament to see what happens in the future,” says Miller.