Asked by: Callum McCaig (Scottish National Party - Aberdeen South)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what the level of investment in renewable electricity generation in Scotland was in each of the last five years.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
In Delivering UK Energy Investment: Low Carbon Energy March 2015 [1], it is estimated that since 2010 £6 billion was invested in renewable electricity technologies across Scotland.
Asked by: Callum McCaig (Scottish National Party - Aberdeen South)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he plans to take to protect UK R&D investment that has been made in Scottish universities after the UK leaves the EU.
Answered by Lord Johnson of Marylebone
The Government is committed to ensuring the UK remains a world leader in international research and innovation. As my Rt Hon Friend the Prime Minister has said, we would welcome an agreement to continue to collaborate with our European partners on major science, research, and technology initiatives. The Chancellor announced in August that the Treasury will guarantee all successful competitively-bid-for EU research funding applied for before the UK leaves the EU, so that UK participants, and their international partners, can be confident that they will have the funding necessary throughout the life of their Horizon 2020 funded project.
At the Autumn Statement 2016, the Government committed an extra £2 billion per year to research and development funding by 2020- 21, including for the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund. This funding is additional to the protection of science resource funding that was announced at the spending review in autumn 2015, where science resource funding was protected in real terms, at £4.7 billion per year, for the rest of the Parliament. In the current financial year, total research and innovation funding is over £6bn.
My Rt Hon Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has also confirmed a further £100m support for collaboration between universities across the range of knowledge exchange activity, and a further £100m for Innovate UK for the Biomedical Catalyst, from 2017/18 to 2020/21. The devolved administrations, including Scotland, will receive funding through the Barnett formula in the usual way in respect of any funding announced for England.
This Government wants the UK to be the go-to place for innovators and investors across the world, and we intend to secure the right outcome for the UK research base as we exit the European Union.
Asked by: Callum McCaig (Scottish National Party - Aberdeen South)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many Horizon 2020-funded research projects are underway in (a) Scotland and (b) the UK; and what steps he is taking to ensure that those projects will continue to have access to that funding after the UK leaves the EU.
Answered by Lord Johnson of Marylebone
As of September 2016, there were 5,428 participations in Horizon 2020 across the UK, with 566 participations in Scotland 1.
The Treasury will underwrite all successful bids for Horizon 2020 that are approved by the Commission, even when specific projects continue beyond the departure from the EU. UK businesses and universities should continue to bid for competitive EU funds while we remain a member of the EU, and we will work with the Commission to ensure payment when funds are awarded.
1https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/uks-participation-in-horizon-2020-september-2016
Asked by: Callum McCaig (Scottish National Party - Aberdeen South)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment his Department has made of the feasibility of suspending the privatisation of the Green Investment Bank.
Answered by Nick Hurd
The sale process was launched on 3 March 2016 and is currently ongoing. No final decisions have yet been taken.