GeneWatch UK submission to the House of Lords Science and
Technology Committee’s inquiry into setting funding priorities for
scientific and technological research
September 2009
1. GeneWatch UK is a not-for-profit policy research group concerned with the
science, ethics, policy and regulation of genetic technologies.
2. One of our aims is to improve public understanding, accountability and
participation in decision making about science and technology, including
decision-making about science policy and research priorities. In our view more
accountable and democratic decision-making processes would lead to a more
balanced, independent and open scientific research agenda.
3. We welcome the opportunity to input to the Committee’s inquiry.
What is the overall objective of publicly-funded science and technology
research?
4. There are multiple reasons why it is appropriate for governments to make public
funds available for research in science and technology. These include:
 Increasing understanding of physical, chemical and biological systems;
 Informing policy;
 Problem-solving using the scientific method to collect data and rule out
invalid hypotheses;
 Making new discoveries which might be harnessed in future to develop
new technologies or industrial or commercial applications.
 Exploring the possible future impact of technologies or policies on
physical, biological or chemical systems.
5. New scientific discoveries can sometimes lead to new applications which have
economic value and contribute to growth. However, treating science purely as an
instrument to serve the interests of government and commerce neglects the
important ‘non-instrumental’ roles of science: including the creation of critical
scenarios and world pictures; the stimulation of rational attitudes; and the
production of enlightened practitioners and independent experts.1 It is also
notoriously difficult to predict future technological developments.
How are public funds allocated? Who is involved at each level of the decision
making process? Where appropriate, is the Haldane Principle applied?
6. The idea of the knowledge-based economy (KBE) has become a key driver of
research investment in Britain, Europe and worldwide and underpins how
Government formulates science and engineering policy. The ‘knowledge’
embedded in a product is seen as adding value to it and is protected by
intellectual property rights, which gives value to this knowledge and allows it to
be traded rather than freely used (by applying protectionism to ‘knowledge’ rather
than to goods).
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7. Biosciences and biotechnology – particularly human and plant genomics – are
seen as central to the knowledge-based economy, as are information and
communication technologies.
8. GeneWatch UK has recently completed a major investigation of the influence of
the idea of the KBE on research funding decisions in the biosciences, covering
both health and agriculture. We found that the Haldane Principle – which implies
that scientists rather than politicians should decide how research funds are spent
- does not reflect reality because the entire system of research funding is now
shaped by institutional commitments to the knowledge-based economy. We also
found a near total failure in government science policy documents to recognise
potential conflicts between the research needs of different stakeholders and
institutions (e.g. to recognise that the research priorities of the NHS and the
pharmaceutical industry, or of industrial and smallholder or organic farmers, may
not be the same). This has led to a lack of diversity in funding, with large sums of
money allocated to R&D intended to deliver the ‘visions’ of particular commercial
sectors, via largely undemocratic and unaccountable decisions. These ‘visions’
are claimed to be win-win scenarios, in which investments in particular innovation
strategies are presumed to deliver simultaneous benefits to health, wealth,
security, the environment and the economy. However, they are driven by a
narrow range of commercial interests and are often regarded with considerable
skepticism by members of the public.2,3
9. A small number of unelected individuals are highly influential in creating and
maintaining ‘scientific bandwagons’ which capture a large proportion of resources
on the basis of future promises about what will be delivered. This has created
‘political entrapment’ in particular innovation strategies, in which political
commitments are ‘dug in’, in contrast to a system in which many diverse and
creative alternatives are being pursued.4 In addition, non-instrumental roles of
science (such as increasing understanding) are no longer valued by the decisionmaking system and there is a lack of independent advice for policy making.
There is also a stark contrast between the political commitment to biotechnology
as a driver for growth and the failure of the biotech industry to deliver economic
benefit.5,6
How are science and technology research priorities co-ordinated across
Government?
10. Science and technology priorities are poorly co-ordinated across government.
11. In a study of health research in Canada, Lehoux et al. argue that departmental
divisions within governments are one reason why innovation processes are not
sufficiently informed by down-stream concerns.7 The innovation branch of
government supports national innovation and commercialization activities in
order to promote economic growth, whilst the adoption of medical innovations is
largely constrained by the health policy branch, which seeks to increase
evidence-based decision-making and set priorities given available resources.
These branches of government tend to pull in opposite directions and, whilst the
innovation branch tends to intervene early and mostly upstream, the health policy
branch intervenes through regulation and evaluation just before innovations are
ready to enter the market. Patients, clinicians and decision-makers often struggle
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with the local adoption of innovations because of ethical, clinical, economic or
organizational problems and the innovation process is inefficient because of
investment of time and resources in technologies that lack clinical relevance or
are likely to be misused. Rather than limiting downstream evaluation, the authors
argue that there is a need for clear and strong incentives for innovators to
provide more desirable innovations; and appropriate feedback from health
services and policy research about the level of fit (or misfit) between potential
innovations and their likely real-world use.
12. This approach recognizes that a top-down approach does not necessarily
produce innovations of great practical use and that resistance to innovation may
sometimes be well-founded. This contrasts with the current emphasis on pouring
more money into ‘translation’ of discoveries into clinical practice, and using NHS
procurement to drive adoption of new technologies, whilst weakening regulation
to encourage innovation. For example, no genetic tests for susceptibility to
common diseases currently meet medical screening criteria for use in the general
population – and there are good reasons to doubt that any ever will - yet
ministers have constantly invented new schemes to encourage the
‘mainstreaming’ of genetic testing in healthcare, because they previously
identified this as central to developing a knowledge based economy.8 It is not
surprising that such schemes are unsuccessful.
Is the balance of Government funding between targeted and curiosity-driven,
response-mode research appropriate? How will the current economic climate
change the way funds are allocated in the future?
13. Due to the adoption of the knowledge-based economy as the key driver for
investments in science and technology, scientists have been under increasing
pressure to demonstrate the industrial applicability of their work. However, rather
than delivering the claimed economic benefits, this has led to:
 Increasing strategic use of patents: directed more toward preventing others
from innovating, rather than encouraging innovation, and difficulties in
weeding ‘bad’ applications (those that have little economic value but
nevertheless create a backlog at the patent office and difficulties for
competitors). 9
 The creation of large numbers of university spin-out companies with high
cash burn rates, which ultimately fail.
 Increasing hype and misleading claims by scientists that new cures or other
breakthroughs will be delivered if only they secure the next round of
funding.10
14. Whilst much curiosity-driven research is still funded this is often mis-represented
to policy-makers and the public as being closer to application and/or more
reliable or useful than it actually is. Instead of safeguarding important blue skies
research and the non-instrumental roles of science this has tended to devalue
the benefits of science, which is rarely recognized than anything other than a
means to lay the groundwork for new technologies and products.
15. At the same time, science and innovation has become increasingly disconnected
from the users of research. This is most striking in food and farming research,
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where agricultural colleges and traditional plant breeding have largely
disappeared and research priorities are driven by what can be patented by
commercial seed companies or ‘add value’ for food manufacturers. The restructuring of the research councils to deliver supposed biotech solutions has
also led to the loss of important knowledge and skills in other areas such as soil
science and farmland management.
16. There are likely to be significant opportunity costs as a result of poor investments
made via the current research funding system. Billions of pounds and euros are
being spent on ineffective or spurious solutions to major social, environmental,
health and economic problems: including hunger and obesity.
17. In addition, the public is becoming increasingly alienated and disillusioned and is
sceptical that research priorities are being set in the public interest or that they
will deliver economic benefits. For example, the Science Horizons project found
that it is widely assumed that policy-makers in government and big business are
not candid with citizens and that technology is being developed by industry
and/or government in order to make profits, rather than in response to societal
needs.
18. The current economic situation is likely to restrict the availability of future funds,
but also provides an opportunity to revisit science policy and to recognise the
enormous opportunity costs of the current system.
How is publicly-funded research aligned and co-ordinated with research that is
not publicly funded? How can industry be encouraged to participate in
research seeking to answer societal needs?
19. In the healthcare sector, public sector funding is strongly influenced by
commercial research priorities and certain kinds of research attract little if any
funding, either because results cannot be patented or they are of little scientific
interest.11 As a consequence, public health research, for example, is poorly coordinated and funded, despite the potential to deliver significant cost savings for
the NHS.
20. Currently, research institutions and decision-making processes are designed to
encourage public-private partnerships which subsidise the research strategies of
particular industrial sectors, but not which serve the needs of public bodies, such
as the NHS, or the wider public good.
21. Major investment decisions in R&D and in research infrastructure are made
without due scientific diligence or cost-benefit analysis. ‘Optimism bias’ – leading
to significant underestimates of social, environmental and economic risks - is rife.
Yet the UK Treasury does not apply its rules for economic assessment or
appraisal to major R&D investments, unlike other major infrastructure projects. In
adopting this approach, policy makers undermine the knowledge and debate on
which they and society at large rely to make informed decisions and to make
realistic and informed appraisals of techno-scientific claims: they become
dependent on the latest promises that major breakthroughs will be delivered if
only more public subsidy is forthcoming. This risks throwing good money after
bad.
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22. In practice, the key features of the knowledge-based economy distort the market
in ways that make research investment decisions unaccountable to either market
forces or democratic processes. Problems include that:
 protectionism in knowledge, via intellectual property rights, distorts research
priorities and blocks competition and collective innovation;
 pre-competitive subsidy, via research funding decisions, lacks accountability
and transparency and hides political and business commitments as if they
were inevitable consequences of science and ‘progress’;
 public-private partnerships and public procurement policies shift investment
risks and externalities onto the taxpayer, intermediaries such farmers, doctors
and health services, and members of the public;
 ‘light-touch’ regulation fails to address market failures and protect health or
the environment.
23. A better approach would involve:
 Openly recognising conflicts between different interests and investment
priorities and the need for policy trade-offs, necessitating political decisions;
 Recognising governance and regulation as part of the system that influences
who bears the costs and risks, or reaps the benefits, of innovation;
 Advocating approaches that examine and decide these trade-offs in a fair,
democratic and transparent way;
 Viewing economic benefits as being rooted in society – for example,
supporting rural economies and livelihoods – rather than in terms of gains for
venture capitalists or city traders, or growth in particular industrial sectors
such as food manufacture or pharmaceuticals.
To what extent should publicly-funded science and technology research be
focused on areas of economic importance? How should these areas be
identified?
24. Attempting to identify areas of economic importance is fraught with difficulty. For
example, the 1995 Foresight Report on health and life sciences includes
“genetics in risk evaluation and management” for common multi-factorial
diseases, such as heart disease, as a key area for greater investment,
concluding that “Consumer demand will certainly be strong, and the export
potential is high”.12 This idea has been variously endorsed by the Working Group
on the Financing of High Technology Businesses (1998);13 the 1999 Genome
Valley report;14 the 2000 NHS Plan;15 the Foresight Programme’s report
Healthcare 2020;16 the DTI’s ‘Excellence and opportunity: A science and
innovation policy for the 21st Century’17; and the Committee’s reports on Genetic
Databases and Genomic Medicine (2001 and 2009). Billions of pounds were
invested in centralizing electronic medical records in the NHS Spine in order to
implement this vision,18 as well as hundreds of millions more in genetic research
which has delivered little in terms of benefit to health.19,20 In practice, consumer
demand for such tests is negligible – with one of the market leaders, DeCode
Genetics, on the verge of bankruptcy - and none of the available tests provide
information of any medical value.21,8
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25. An alternative approach to dealing with policy-making in the face of considerable
uncertainty has been proposed by the Foresight obesity project22, which
developed an initial strategy to tackle obesity based on a diversity of crossdisciplinary research over long timescales. The project advocated a ‘practicebased evidence’ approach, involving monitoring the strategy over different
timescales and modifying it as it becomes clearer which actions are the most
effective.23 This would involve scientists being more fully involved in assessment
and re-focusing of strategies and taking more responsibility for the wider
implications of their research. The Foresight obesity project also adopted a
‘problem-led’, rather than a ‘technology-driven’ approach, in which the
biosciences may play a role but biotechnological innovations are not seen as the
ultimate objective. Instead, the report identified five core principles for tackling
obesity:
 A system-wide approach, redefining the nation’s health as a societal and
economic issue
 Higher priority for the prevention of health problems, with clearer leadership,
accountability, strategy and management structures
 Engagement of stakeholders within and outside Government
 Long-term, sustained interventions
 Ongoing evaluation and a focus on continuous improvement.
How does the UK science and technology research funding strategy compare
with that of other countries? How does England compare with the devolved
administrations?
26. Many of the structural problems with allocating R&D funding are similar in other
countries because the OECD’s concept of the knowledge-based economy has
been widely adopted in the EU and North America, where it is seen as a means
of competing with the emerging economies of China and India, by adopting
protectionism in knowledge (via Intellectual Property) rather than in manufactured
goods.24 The OECD’s measures – including patents, citations, R&D expenditure
and numbers of spin-out companies from universities - are now widely used to
measure the development of the knowledge-based economy. For example, in its
2007 analysis, the EC’s Biopolis project used fourteen indicators to measure the
performance of the national biotechnology system of innovation in Europe: only
one of these indicators (numbers of biomedicines) is likely to represent actual
marketable products. 25 Research suggests that the net value to the economy of
this approach to driving science and innovation by ‘monetizing intellectual
property’ has been zero or negative.6
27. In contrast, the Scottish Government has set five strategic objectives: to be
wealthier and fairer; healthier; safer and stronger; smarter; and greener.26 In this
context, it has conducted a review of the areas where science in its broadest
sense can make a contribution to policy development relevant to Scotland, in
order to help shape the next Scottish Government Rural, Environment and
Marine research strategy.27 The review will be used to develop a policy
framework, which will then be consulted on.
28. Scotland’s review sought to identify policy relevant drivers, trends and challenges
over the next 30 years; together with knowledge gaps and potential research
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needs, from the perspective of a range of stakeholders, including government,
researchers and civic society. A number of important knowledge gaps were
identified. In addition, key findings were:
 Many of the drivers of change and associated knowledge gaps are linked,
and research programmes should take account of this interconnectedness.
This approach requires a shift from analytical thinking to contextual thinking.
Indeed Scotland could be considered as a national ecosystem - with the need
to address the social, economic and environmental aspects of the system.
 There would be benefit from developing mechanisms for better integration of
research into policy and better integration across policy areas.
 Scotland's environment, agriculture and marine resources cannot be studied
in isolation from changing patterns of societal demands and expectations or
Scotland's economic welfare.
 There are advantages in understanding the role of the natural environment in
the economy as well as understanding links between environment, vibrant
communities and entrepreneurship, particularly for rural areas.
 It is important to note the need for research programmes to be fuelled by and
to increase innovation. This involves dialogue, networking and collaboration
in shaping and developing the research. In addition, barriers to innovation
such as planning and licensing issues should be considered at an early stage
to ensure that desired outcomes can be achieved.
29. Scotland has thus adopted a more problem-led and more multi-disciplinary
approach, involving more dialogue and consultation. In GeneWatch UK’s view
this is more likely to deliver a more diverse system of science and innovation,
which serves the interests of society as a whole and is more democratically
accountable.
For further information contact:
Dr Helen Wallace
Director
GeneWatch UK
60 Lightwood Road
Buxton
Derbyshire
SK17 7BB
Tel: 01298 24300
Email: helen.wallace@genewatch.org
Website: www.genewatch.org
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