A recent review of the British economy in the Economist (27 March 2010) highlights Britain's 'strong scientific base and world-leading universities' as one of three strengths of our future economy.
James Dyson, in his paper Ingenious Britain (March 2010), commissioned by David Cameron, makes a similar point: "There is a real opportunity to set a new vision for our economy… to do this a new government must… put science and engineering at the centre of its thinking."
Likewise Gordon Brown said in a major speech in Oxford last year: "The downturn is no time to slow our investment in science but to build more vigorously for the future," while science minister Lord Drayson told the House of Commons science and technology select committee that "Science is absolutely essential to the achievement of… growth" (February 24th 2010).
In short, there is agreement that future prosperity and employment in this country will depend to a significant degree on investment in science and engineering to create the knowledge economy.
A recent report by the Royal Society, Britain's National Academy of Sciences, entitled The Scientific Century: securing our future prosperity, explores this proposition in detail. Scientific research is one of the few areas in which the UK remains near the top of the premier league: with one per cent of the world's population and three per cent of the world's funding, we produce 14.4 per cent of the world's most highly cited papers, second only to the USA.
This is in spite of the fact that the UK invests a smaller proportion of GDP (1.9 per cent) in research and development than our major competitors (typically about 2.5 per cent). During the past decade or so, public investment in science has increased, but private investment remains very low compared with our competitors.
What is more, at a time when we are cutting investment in science and universities (£600m cuts have been announced, with more to follow) other countries are investing heavily. France has announced an increase of €35 billion, Germany €12bn and the $21bn, not to mention the 20 per cent per annum increase in China.
Science is a global enterprise, and our ability to attract and retain the best brains will be under serious threat over the years ahead, unless our investment matches that of our rivals. At the moment we are a magnet for talent from all over the world, but I have seen in my career how easy it is for top scientist to up sticks and move elsewhere.
But is there evidence that investment in science and engineering really does produce jobs and economic growth? It used be said that we are good at science but bad at exploiting the results for economic gain.
This has all changed. In the period 2000-2008, patents granted to UK universities increased by 136 per cent, and university spinouts had, by 2007/08, a turnover of £1.1bn and employed 14,000 people.
Many of these people will be high earners, with beneficial knock-on effects for goods and services in their communities.
Two key features of science are the long time lags and unpredictability of where the commercial benefits arise. The Medical Research Council estimates that the time lag between research and health benefits is typically between 10 and 25 years.
You only have to look at the major scientific discoveries in the UK that have transformed our lives, from the generation of electricity by Michael Faraday, to the discovery of DNA fingerprinting by Alec Jeffries, monoclonal antibodies by Cesar Milstein, and the development of the internet by Tim Berners-Lee, to realise that basic research leads in quite unexpected ways to important commercial and public benefits.
If our investment in science is not sustained, we will export our best brains and ideas to other countries, just as we have exported much of our manufacturing industry, and look forward to economic decline.
William Waldegrave, after the 1997 election, left a note on the chief secretary's desk for his successor, Alistair Darling, saying, "There are some things that may not have huge public support but are vital for the public. Protect them. The security services and science – you can't switch them on and off."
I hope that whoever is in government will get the message and recognise that investing in science is ultimately investing in jobs, growth and prosperity for the future.
As the Royal Society's report says: "Unless we get smarter, we will get poorer."
Lord Krebs Kt FRS is principal of Jesus College Oxford. He is a cross-bench peer and a member of the House of Lords science and technology committee.
