ARIA: Scoping Our Planet Programme

Lord Reid of Cardowan Excerpts

Tuesday 8th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I have not looked at that specific point, but I accept that that is indeed a possibility. The Freedom of Information Act has an enormous number of important roles, but it can be overwhelming. That is another reason why a very small organisation such as ARIA, which is focused on getting its work out while being very transparent about what it is doing, is freed from some of the requirements of that Act, which can place a very large administrative burden on a small organisation.

[Lord Reid of Cardowan (Lab)]

My Lords, when the Minister is considering whether to apply freedom of information, will he consider the learned comments of the former Prime Minister who introduced it, Mr Blair, who described it as the worst mistake he ever made?

[Lord Vallance of Balham (Lab)]

I will not get into whether it was or was not that, but I say again that we have no plans to bring ARIA under the Freedom of Information Act, which I think is important. If we go back to the origins of ARPA—the organisation in the US that led to DARPA, IARPA and many other such organisations on which ARIA is based—its originators in the 1950s and 1960s said that the reason no other country had managed to emulate that successful programme was because they kept everything on too short a leash. We should not make that mistake.