professor of research policy @UCLSTEaPP | director @RoRInstitute
Mar 17, 2022 • 14 tweets • 7 min read
Four years on from its creation as the UK's £8bn a year integrated funding agency for research and innovation, @UKRI_News today publishes its first comprehensive strategy. /thread ukri.org/news/ukri-stra…
It's a rich & impressive document, which bears the hallmarks of Ottoline Leyser's commitments to holistic systems thinking, diversity & inclusion, and improving research cultures. @UKRI_CEO
Feb 3, 2022 • 13 tweets • 8 min read
'ARIA will give tremendous power to those who sit inside its black box, making decisions about whom & what to fund. If ARIA succeeds...it must not do so behind closed doors.' Editorial in @Nature as ARIA Bill passes, unamended through Parliament. nature.com/articles/d4158…
Good to see a nod here to last week’s @FoundSciTech debate, where I raised this issue with @uksciencechief, as part of a broader shift towards securitisation & secrecy in UK public research funding. foundation.org.uk/Events/2022/Ho…
Feb 2, 2022 • 19 tweets • 7 min read
A few quick thoughts on R&D aspects of the #LevellingUp white paper: #thread 1/
Overall, much to admire & digest. It’s a serious piece of work—& represents a welcome attempt to synthesise the evidence base on regional inequality & opportunity across the UK. 2/
Jun 21, 2021 • 10 tweets • 5 min read
The ‘new’ Office for Science & Technology Strategy looks remarkably like the old OST, restored to its former base in the Cabinet Office: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of…
As well as a souped-up job title for @uksciencechief, this configuration presumably brings with it the current Govt Office for Science (from BEIS)—though the No.10 release is opaque on this point… gov.uk/government/new…
Jul 1, 2020 • 12 tweets • 3 min read
UK’s ‘R&D roadmap’ is published today by @beisgovuk. It reaffirms govt’s pledge to double public R&D investment to £22bn a year by 2025, and initiates a consultation on how this should be allocated gov.uk/government/new… (1/9)
Initial headlines: 300m fast-tracked for scientific infrastructure; new ‘Office for Talent’ based in No.10 to attract ‘top global science, research & innovation talent’; extension for PhD graduates’ right to live & work in UK to 3 years; & new Innovation Expert Group. (2/9)
Apr 25, 2020 • 9 tweets • 3 min read
No.10’s response to the Guardian’s SAGE scoop - trying to downplay political advisers’ participation as routine - fails to address the fundamental point, as raised by @Sir_David_King, that this is far from normal. And he should know, as a former @uksciencechief.
It also contravenes the second of the government’s own principles of scientific advice to government - “scientific advisers should be free from political interference with their work” gov.uk/government/pub…
