24/05/06 Peter Cotgreave met with Stephen
Andrews of the British Library
24/05/06 Scientific
advice to Government
In evidence to Parliament, CaSE today urged the Government
to do more to stimulate a scientific culture in Whitehall. Testifying
to the Science & Technology Select Committee, CaSE said that high
profile areas attracting media attention tended to be handled more
effectively than before, and contrasted the handling of mad cow disease
with that of avian flu. But on the day-to-day grind of ensuring that
taxpayers get what they pay for, there is still much to do. "Just
this morning, there is an Audit Office report showing that the Small
Business Service does not know which of its schemes work and which
do not," said Dr Peter Cotgreave, "it's not doing what a
scientist would do and measuring the effects of its interventions
and making comparisons". CaSE also said that with the Office
of Science & Innovation now accounting for more than half of the
budget of the Trade Department, the UK was moving towards having a
Science Ministry in all but name.
23/05/06 Peter Cotgreave and Caroline Holland met with Jonathan Flint,
Chief Executive of Oxford Instruments
16/05/06 Funding for university teaching
CaSE today heavily criticised the Higher Education Funding
Council for failing to acknowledge the need to fund science and engineering
teaching in the universities. In an article in the Guardian, CaSE
points out that laboratory science is an essential part of a science
degree, and that HEFCE's changes to its funding practices have left
university science departments in jeopardy. CaSE suggests that perhaps
funding for science should be ring-fenced by the Office of Science
and Innovation, just as the NHS controls the funds for teaching students
in clinical subjects.
read
the article
16/05/06 Science in
Wales
CaSE was today delighted to be one the organisation involved in Science
and The Welsh Assembly, an event in Cardiff to engage Wales's
politicians with the scientific community. "CaSE has been at
the forefront of efforts to ensure that Wales has a strong science
policy," said Dr Peter Cotgreave, "producing a science manifesto
for Wales, holding husting meetings before Welsh elections, testifying
to the Assembly, meeting with ministers and appearing in the Welsh
media." The Royal Society of Chemistry organised today's event
on behalf of the wider scientific community, and a good proportion
of Members of the Welsh Assembly attended to interact with scientists
and engineers.
read more about
CaSE in Wales
11/05/06 Caroline Holland met with Prof Tom Millar, Dean of Physical
Sciences at Queen's University Belfast
10/05/06 University
science
CaSE today met with the Head of Science at the Treasury, the Director
General of the Research Councils and a group of chemistry professors
to discuss the state of science in the universities. "Chemistry
has been especially hard hit in the recent trouble universities are
having," said Dr Peter Cotgreave, Director of CaSE, "so
it was excellent to be able to discuss the Government's university
policy relating to physical sciences both with Sir Keith O'Nions of
the Office of Science & Innovation and Caroline Barr of the Treasury".
10/05/06 Research funding
CaSE today called for a fair distribution of research funding
that supports the kinds of research the nation needs, including exciting
and innovative research. In a letter to Research Fortnight, commenting
on proposed changes to the Research Assessment Exercise, CaSE points
out that arguments against reform are weak, and that the new system
not just promote 'safe' research with guaranteed outcomes.
The text of the letter is given below:
Bahram Bekhradnia’s rush to defend the Research Assessment
Exercise (RF 26/04/06) appears to miss the point. Despite his contrary
assertion, there is, as Rebecca Boden says in the same issue of RF,
‘an undeniable correlation between RAE scores and research income
[principally from the Research Councils]’.
All the arguments in the world about the value of the RAE cannot obscure
the fact that a back-of-the-envelope calculation gives an extremely
good first order prediction of the outcome, while in practice it is
achieved by a large number of the country’s best researchers
spending the equivalent of a year doing paperwork instead of the getting
on with their research.
The arguments against reform are hopelessly weak. For example, Bekhradnia
points out that under the current proposals, “somebody will
lose out”. Of course they will. The only way of preventing such
losses would be to fix funding allocations permanently, ossifying
the system. And to claim that new arrangements will hasten the closure
of physical science departments in universities ignores the fact that
these closures are caused by a combination of relatively low student
demand and HEFCE’s bizarre and unfair funding model for teaching.
Rebecca Boden is right that the dual support system is supposed to
provide freedom for academics to ‘follow their noses,’
but everyone knows that in recent years, such freedom has been largely
mythical. Safe research that is guaranteed to produce outputs that
score well in the RAE is preferred over genuinely innovative research,
especially work that is high-risk but has potentially high-rewards.
What we need is a system that delivers to the universities a fair
distribution of the available research funding (which will always
fall far short of academics' potential to use it) and that preserves
the discretion to follow unfashionable lines of inquiry. The RAE is
not the right system and rather than pretend that it is, we should
judge potential replacements not on how closely they reproduce the
outcome of the RAE, but on how well they might support the sort of
research we most want to see done.
05/05/06 HEFCE
CaSE today pressed the case for the Higher Education Funding Council
to change its funding model to remove inherent bias against science.
At a brief meeting, CaSE increased the pressure on HEFCE to justify
its decision to slash the weighting given to science in its funding
formula. "The Government has a ten-year plan for science,"
said Dr Peter Cotgreave, Director of CaSE, "but it stands no
chance of delivering it if one of its own agencies keeps marching
in the opposite direction.
04/05/06 Deans of Science
CaSE was today delighted to interact with the UK Deans of
Science to discuss issues currently facing scientists in universities.
At the Deans' annual meeting in Birmingham, CaSE Director Peter Cotgreave
discussed the Research Assessment Exercise, funding for university
teaching, policy changes announced in the Budget, and how to meet
the scientific needs of industry. "The Deans of Science are on
the ground, facing these challenges on a daily basis," said Peter
Cotgreave, "and it is extremely useful for CaSE to hear direct
and first-hand from representatives of such a wide range of institutions."
03/05/06 University
science
CaSE was today delighted that backbenchers criticised the
'arbitrary' and 'damaging' decision, based on 'circular arguments'
to cut the ratio of funding for science in universities, and disappointed
at the complaisant attitude of the Government. "During a Parliamentary
debate, MPs that had been briefed by CaSE lambasted the bizarre and
unjustifiable decision to switch funding out of the sciences,"
said Peter Cotgreave, Director of CaSE. "But the minister, Bill
Rammell, had to be prompted to answer the point, wanted until the
last 90 seconds of the available time to avoid having to go into any
detail, and then said that he couldn't act without 'sustained and
convicing evidence' that other subjects were overfunded. That's a
bit rich given that the current formula is based on ridiculous, unjustifiable
and manifestly unsupportable assumptions. Sadly, university science
departments are closing because of this attitude, despite the constant
mantra that the Government wants the UK to the best place for science,
which Mr Rammell repeated this morning."
02/05/06 Manufacturing industry
CaSE today argued that the UK needs to be much more competitive as
a place for industry to perform research and development if we are
to have any chance of sustaining the manufacturing section of the
economy. In an article in Laboratory News, CaSE points out
that when Peugeot announced its decision to close its factory in the
West Midlands to consolidate in France, it was noticeable that its
R&D was already centred in France. The Rover car company, which
closed in the same region last year, had closed down its R&D facilities
altogether. "If companies - British or foreign - can see a reason
to site their design and development elements in this country, they
will not only create jobs directly at their high technology facilities,
but will also look at the possibility of bringing other parts of their
business to the UK," concludes the article.
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