Chris Green

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) plays a crucial role in sustaining the UK’s position as a life sciences superpower and will continue to play a pivotal role in delivering the ambitions set out in the Life Sciences Vision, which was co-developed by Government and the sector.

NICE is continuing to deliver its Methods Review which will ensure NICE retains its global leadership in the evaluation and appraisal of new medicines and technologies. As an independent body, NICE is responsible for its own methods and processes.

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy will continue to work closely with the wide range of public and private sector bodies and stakeholders across the sector, including NICE, to deliver the Life Sciences Vision.

The UK Government will invest £14.9 billion in R&D this year, bringing investment to its highest level in four decades. This is a major step towards our commitment to increase total public and private R&D investment to 2.4 per cent of GDP by 2027.

Through the Manufacturing Made Smarter Challenge, the government will invest £147 million (matched by a minimum of £147 million from industry) to transform the UK’s manufacturing capabilities through the development and adoption of industrial digital technologies. The Challenge will support businesses to implement new tech to boost their manufacturing productivity, helping them reach new customers, create thousands of new highly skilled jobs, slash carbon emissions and reduce prices for customers.

The Government has also recently launched the Medicines and Diagnostics Manufacturing Transformation Fund (MDMTF), a £20 million fund offering capital grants to businesses, incentivising them to place internationally mobile high value manufacturing investments in the UK. The MDMTF will increase the production of medicines and diagnostic equipment in the UK. In doing so, it seeks also to support companies in adopting new technologies which boost productivity, drive down costs and which have less impact on the environment.

The Government will also publish a Life Sciences Vision later this year which will set out our ambition for supporting growth of the life sciences sector, including in manufacturing.

To date, no financial or other resources have been allocated from the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy’s (BEIS) budget to investigate potential future uses by the department of the NHS Test and Trace database system.

The corporate functions of the Department do not have access to the NHS Test and Trace database system. The Department therefore does not currently plan to use it.

No assessment has yet been made, nor any decisions made, on whether to use the data systems used by NHS Test and Trace for other purposes beyond those related to Covid-19. Any work to assess potential future uses of these data systems would be met from within the financial resources already allocated to NHS Test and Trace for the 2021/22 financial year.

Network charging is a matter for Ofgem, as the independent regulator, and decisions on its Targeted Charging Review (TCR) are for it to make. Through the TCR, Ofgem is seeking to ensure all parties connected to the electricity network make a fair contribution to its fixed costs. This is consistent with Government’s views on the importance of an energy system that ensures a fair distribution of costs, with solutions rewarded where they contribute to reduced system costs.

Ofgem has published an analysis of the expected impacts of the TCR reforms at: https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/electricity/transmission-networks/charging/targeted-charging-review-significant-code-review . Ofgem is working to implement the reforms by April 2022 through code changes, with the final aspects of those code changes being consulted on shortly.

The Government continues to engage with Ofgem to inform our understanding of the reforms’ policy implications, and we will also give careful consideration to the related recommendations of the recent UK Steel report “Closing the Gap”.

Network charging is a matter for Ofgem, as the independent regulator, and decisions on its Targeted Charging Review (TCR) are for it to make. Through the TCR, Ofgem is seeking to ensure all parties connected to the electricity network make a fair contribution to its fixed costs. This is consistent with Government’s views on the importance of an energy system that ensures a fair distribution of costs, with solutions rewarded where they contribute to reduced system costs.

Ofgem has published an analysis of the expected impacts of the TCR reforms at: https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/electricity/transmission-networks/charging/targeted-charging-review-significant-code-review . Ofgem is working to implement the reforms by April 2022 through code changes, with the final aspects of those code changes being consulted on shortly.

The Government continues to engage with Ofgem to inform our understanding of the reforms’ policy implications, and we will also give careful consideration to the related recommendations of the recent UK Steel report “Closing the Gap”.

The Government is committed to minimising energy costs for businesses to ensure our economy remains strong and competitive. The ability for our industries to be able to compete across Europe and globally is a priority for this Government.

The Government has put moving to a cleaner, greener economy at the heart of its Industrial Strategy, especially with our commitment to Net Zero. Our aim is to work with the steel sector and help them to reduce carbon emissions. We will continue to support the steel sector in achieving these aims through the various funds available such as the Industrial Energy Transformation Fund and Clean Steel Fund.

We estimate that reduction in the various renewable costs for eligible energy intensive industries, including steel, will save them around £400m a year in electricity costs. We have also extended the schemes to compensate certain energy intensive industries for indirect emission cost to the end of the next financial year in order to minimise disruption to existing recipients whilst we conduct a review. Between 2013 and 2019, total compensation paid to the steel sector was over £480m.

We welcome the recent report by UK Steel - “Closing the Gap” - regarding electricity prices and will give its recommendations careful consideration.

We welcome this report and will give its recommendations careful consideration.

The UK has world leading science and research capabilities and we have already committed to utilising these to address the COVID-19 challenges, in close collaboration with the research and business communities in the advanced manufacturing sector.

In April we announced a £1.25 billion package to help ensure innovative firms in some of the most dynamic sectors of the UK economy – including life sciences – are protected through the COVID-19 crisis so they can continue to develop innovative new products. As part of this Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), are investing £750 million to support innovation in the country’s most research-intensive businesses during and post the coronavirus pandemic, and to support new ways of dealing with global disruption. The package will include grants, loans, and expanded business advisory support. This package builds on the government’s existing support for innovative, high-growth firms including the £2.5 billion British Patient Capital fund, the upcoming £200 million Life Sciences Investment Programme, internationally competitive R&D tax reliefs and our major commitments to increase public R&D spending to £22 billion by 2024-25.

Currently over £36 million is awarded through UKRI to projects directly related to tackling Covid-19.? This includes £24.6 million awarded across 27 projects, including for testing a vaccine, developing therapies and improving understanding of how to treat COVID-19, awarded through a Rapid Response call (now closed) run jointly with the?National Institute for Health Research .

We are also supporting the development of a coronavirus vaccine, working to ensure the UK has the manufacturing capability to produce these at the levels the UK needs. This is at the early stages but progressing rapidly. A new cross government vaccines taskforce has been set up, reporting to the Secretaries of State for BEIS and DHSC as well as Sir Patrick Vallance. It brings together government, industry, academics, funding agencies and other partners to make rapid decisions in order to accelerate vaccine development in the UK, working closely with the BioIndustry Association.

This taskforce is reviewing a number of options, including looking at delivering the Vaccines Manufacturing Innovation Centre (VMIC) earlier than the 2022 opening date originally planned. The VMIC was asked to develop a plan for its dramatic acceleration and expansion. As a result the initial phase of the build has now started which is approximately three months ahead of schedule. Further acceleration and expansion options will be presented by the VMIC to the government in due course, and definitive estimates of further time savings will be available at that time.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah MP) on 9 May 2019 to Question 249283. Further to that answer, on 11 July 2019 the Government announced £135 million of funding to support National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Applied Research Collaborations (ARCs). The NIHR ARC scheme will support high-quality applied health and care research to make tangible improvements for patients, the public and to health and care services. NIHR ARCs will work with local partners and patients and the public from across the local communities they serve, and particularly with Academic Health Science Networks, to tackle local health and care priorities.

The 2.4% R&D Roadmap will set overall direction for how we can achieve the 2.4% R&D ambition by 2027, and 3% in the longer term, through the use of strategic public funding to leverage private R&D investment.

It aims to transform R&D intensity across all sectors of the economy, supporting the development of new technologies, industries, and products that bring growth, good jobs across the UK, and social improvements for all.

The 2.4% R&D Roadmap will bring together Government, academia, and industry to collaboratively focus their efforts on increasing R&D investment. In the area of health, this includes the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS R&D activity, and work with industry in taking forward the Life Sciences Sector Deal. The 2.4% R&D Roadmap will also align closely with the Industrial Strategy’s Grand Challenges. This includes the Ageing Society Grand Challenge which will create new demands for technologies, products and services for an ageing population, and the AI and Data Grand Challenge which will use data, artificial intelligence, and innovation to transform the prevention, early diagnosis, and treatment of diseases like cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and dementia by 2030.

In order to achieve the 2.4% R&D target, we need to accelerate the growth and build on R&D strengths across the UK. The Government has put in place a number of initiatives to support every part of the UK to identify and leverage their R&D strengths, from Science and Innovation Audits to the Strength in Places Fund. The Strength in Places Fund (SIPF) is investing £237m up to 2021-22 in growing new and existing centres of excellence for research and innovation across the UK.

We are working with Local Economic Partnerships as they develop Local Industrial Strategies to identify science and innovation strengths and the action needed to unlock R&D growth in places across the country.

Through our modern Industrial Strategy we have committed to the highest R&D increase on record. We have announced increases in public R&D spending worth £7bn up to 2021/2022, and we are working with UK Research and Innovation and other key partners to develop a roadmap that sets out how government and industry will work together to reach our target of increasing R&D investment to 2.4% of GDP by 2027, which would be the highest recorded level, and 3% in the longer-term.

The Government recognises that to make best use of this increased level of investment in science we will need to increase the number of researchers and strengthen the pipeline leading to research careers. Though it is too early to assess the impacts of these new programmes we are addressing this need through such programmes as UK Research and Innovation’s £900m Future Leaders Fellowship which aims to attract the best researchers from the UK and from around the world.

The Government has made a commitment to increase overall investment in R&D to 2.4% of GDP by 2027, and 3% in the longer term. This will be the largest increase ever.

The Daphne Jackson Trust and the Wellcome Trust are independent charities that do not receive Government funding for their core activities. We have developed and maintain close relationships with both organisations and have supported and worked in partnership with them on specific projects.

Through its fellowships the Daphne Jackson Trust supports researchers to retrain and return after a career break of two or more years taken for family, caring or health reasons. In 2017 over half of the seventy active Daphne Jackson Fellowships were sponsored by one or more Research Councils.

The Department has partnered with the Wellcome Trust to deliver the Inspiring Science Fund which supports science centres to create opportunities for young people, with an increased focus on under-represented and underserved audiences, to learn about and engage with science, technology, engineering and maths

The Government recognizes the need to enhance the UK’s research talent pipeline and increase the number of opportunities on offer for highly-skilled researchers and innovators and has taken steps to do so.

For example, in June 2018 we announced £1.3bn investment in UK talent and skills to grow and attract the best in science and innovation. This includes:

• £900m invested for the UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship which is open to the best researchers from around the world.
• £50m invested to existing programmes that are delivered through UKRI which include 300 additional PhDs, 90 additional Knowledge Transfer Partnerships, and up to 300 PhD additional Innovation Placements
• £350m invested for prestigious National Academy fellowships.

As part of the Government’s commitment to increase overall investment in R&D to 2.4% of GDP by 2027, which would be the highest recorded level, and 3% in the longer-term. We are building capacity in a number of ways.

For example, we are boosting capacity in artificial intelligence through new AI Masters and AI Centres for Doctoral Training, delivering 1,000 additional PhDs in AI and Turing AI Fellows.

We are also boosting capacity in specific places across the UK, building on R&D strengths through our Strength in Places Fund. Twenty-four ambitious projects from pharmaceuticals to aerospace, and transport to the creative economy, are to receive early-stage funding to develop full-stage bids that could lead to significant economic growth in places across the country.

I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave my hon. Friend the Member for North Herefordshire on 26 March 2019 to Question 233471 on the funding of research projects with EU funding.