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Whitsun 2008 SCIENCE in PARLIAMENT Whitsun 2008 SCIENCE IN PARLIAMENT Bioethics New Diseases Business Needs Scientists and Engineers Science in the Regions Chemical engineering tackles the 21st Century Gordian Knot Science in Parliament Vol 64 No 3 Summer 2007 The Journal of the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee http://www.scienceinparliament.org.uk engineering TOMORROW Meet some of the leading researchers of today and tomorrow at the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council reception, sponsored by Mr Phil Willis MP. House of Commons Terrace Pavilion 7pm, 7th July 2008. For more information contact: [email protected] SCIENCE IN Science in Parliament has two main objectives: a) to inform the scientific and industrial communities PARLIAMENT of activities within Parliament of a scientific nature The Journal of the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee. and of the progress of relevant legislation; The Committee is an Associate Parliamentary Group b) to keep Members of Parliament abreast of members of both Houses of Parliament and British members of the European Parliament, representatives of scientific affairs. of scientific and technical institutions, industrial organisations and universities. We are preparing for the Second Reading debate in the HoC Contents of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill. Whitsun 2008 Volume 65 Number 2 Unlike in the HoL, Opinion by Lord Krebs 2 the Government has conceded free votes Opinion by the Rt Hon John Denham MP 3 for Labour Members 100 Days as the Government Chief Scientific Adviser 4 on issues of Professor John Beddington conscience, which Science in the Home Office 6 are likely to be on admixed hybrid embryos, the need for a father and saviour siblings, as Professor Paul Wiles well as on any amendments to the Bill on Translation in Practice 8 abortion. Sir Leszek Borysiewicz Chemistry & Industry (2008, 7 April, 5) reports A Human Bioethics Commission 10 that Pfizer, in its lawsuits with 3,000 individuals and organisations over its sale of Baroness Warnock COX-2 inhibitors, has failed to make the Why the United Kingdom needs a National Bioethics Commission 11 Journal of the American Medical Association and Professor Lord Alton of Liverpool the Archives of Internal Medicine reveal the UK Innovation in Central Europe 12 names of their peer reviewers. Had Pfizer been successful in this court battle there Alison Winzenried-Pring would have been serious consequences for Facing up to the Grand Challenges 14 the publishers of all learned journals. Andy Furlong The publication by Duckworth Overlook of Tackling the major challenges facing society 16 Nigel Lawson’s book, “An Appeal to Reason”, a sceptical look at climate change, is timely in Professor Dave Delpy view of Parliamentary consideration of the Power Attracts – and Requires – Advice 18 Climate Change Bill. Voice of the Future 19 Government has decided to launch a carbon New Diseases and Renewed Threats 20 capture and storage competition to clean up coal burning power plants with post- Addresses to the P&SC by Prof Hugh Pennington, Prof Nigel Minton and Prof Andrew McMichael combustion technology. Would it not have been better to give pre-combustion carbon Science in the Regions 26 capture an equal chance of success to kick- Addresses to the P&SC by Dr Ed Metcalfe, Dr George Baxter and start the hydrogen economy? The race is on, Prof Colin Whitehouse but Japan has the clear lead at this point in What does British Industry want from our Scientists and Engineers? 32 time. Seminar jointly arranged by DIUS and P&SC Nature (2008, 452, 674) has revealed that, of 1400 scientists surveyed in 60 countries, one Parliamentary and Scientific Committee News 39 in five had used methylphenidate (better Letters to the Editor 40 known as Ritalin), modafinil, or beta-blockers House of Commons Select Committee on Innovation, to enhance their cognitive performance. Universities, Science and Skills 41 The controversial Galileo project finally got House of Lords Science and Technology Select Committee 43 off the ground on 27 April with the launch of the second and final test satellite Giove-B, put Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology 44 into orbit by a Soyuz rocket in Kazakhstan. It House of Commons Library Science and Environment Section 45 carries the most accurate atomic clock in the Debates and Selected Parliamentary Questions and Answers 46 world. This is Europe’s equivalent to the US Euro-News 54 GPS system for navigation. Science Directory 55 Dr Brian Iddon MP Chairman, Editorial Board Science Diary 64 Science in Parliament Front cover: The Gordian Knot - often used as a metaphor for an intractable problem solved by a bold stroke. (credit: Piotr Pieranski, Poznan University of Technology, Poland) ISSN 0263-6271 Science in Parliament Vol 65 No 2 Whitsun 2008 1 OPINION Professor Lord Krebs Kt FRS n recent years, much has been said scientific knowledge, unlike the and written about evidence-based textbook certainties of school science, Ipolicy, and the UK has exceedingly is incomplete. When I was Chairman good structures and processes in place of the Food Standards Agency, policy to ensure that ministers and officials decisions on many key issues, from have access to high quality advice on BSE to acrylamide to Sudan 1, were science, including the social sciences, based on assessment of incomplete that are so important in many policy evidence. areas. But when different groups of scientific This is not to say that there should be experts look at the same evidence and a simple linear flow from scientific come to different conclusions, extra advice to policy, since many other confusion is added. reduce the incidence of TB in cattle by factors, including ethics, feasibility, about 25%. Scale is important, acceptability, costs and benefits come A recent example is the spat between because around the edges of the into play as science is woven into the the Royal Commission on culling area the risk of TB increases, fabric of policy decisions. Environmental Pollution and the possibly because of the immigration Advisory Committee on Pesticides effect. The minimum area for a net But the scientific waters may about the so-called ‘bystander effect’, benefit is 250 to 300 km2. Even then themselves get muddied and this can the possibility that people living near the disease would not be eliminated. cause extra difficulties for policy fields during pesticide spraying suffer makers. ill-heath as a result. The RCEP The Independent Scientific Group set concluded that it is “plausible that there up to oversee the culling trials The media are far from blameless in could be a link between pesticide exposure concluded that large-scale culling this. Although the science and ill-health” whilst the ACP should not be adopted, whilst a correspondents of the serious concluded from the same evidence smaller group, with less expertise, newspapers and the BBC are excellent, that “pesticide toxicity is unlikely to meeting for a day under the science reporting may go awry when it contribute importantly to chronic fatigue chairmanship of the then Chief gets into other hands. On March 28th, syndrome or multiple chemical sensitivity”. Scientific Adviser, concluded the as I sat down to draft this piece, the The evidence is not water tight, but opposite. Perhaps based on this, the Times carried a headline on page 15 surely the two groups would have Welsh Assembly Government has that stated: “Mother told me of child’s done themselves a favour, in terms of announced that it intends to go ahead autism after MMR jab, doctor claims”. the credibility of scientific advice for with a cull in areas where TB is a The cursory reader of this policy, by talking through their particular problem (hotspots), irresponsible piece of journalism could differing interpretations? although in England, Defra has not yet be forgiven for thinking that the issue decided. of whether or not MMR causes autism, Another, more recent, example relates that has caused thousands of parents to badgers and bovine tuberculosis. If scorched earth culling were adopted to put their children at unnecessary My 1997 report concluded that whilst over all the hotspot areas in the South risk, is still live. In fact the article was it was clear that badgers do transmit West and South Wales, an estimated about Andrew Wakefield’s appearance TB to cattle, it was not clear whether 170,000 badgers would be killed, well in front of the General Medical or not culling badgers would be an over half the UK population. Even Council charged with serious effective control strategy. In response, then, success is not guaranteed: in the professional misconduct. MAFF/Defra set up the large-scale Republic of Ireland, scorched earth randomised badger culling trials to culling did lead to an initial decrease But what about when the scientists investigate the efficacy of culling. in TB, but last year there is a reported themselves disagree? Disagreement 15% increase. Alternatives such as and challenge is central to the process The results suggest that ‘reactive improved testing and incentives to of science. Nobel Prize-winning culling’ (removing badgers from an keep badgers away from cattle would physicist Richard Feyman defined area in response to an outbreak of TB cost less and be at least as likely to science as “organised scepticism in the in cattle) might actually make things work. However, if ministers are reliability of expert opinion”. So it should worse, perhaps because culling expected to implement evidence-based not be surprising that there is a often a encourages new, diseased animals to policies, the scientists must be spectrum of opinion amongst scientific immigrate. However, large-scale, expected to be clear and consistent in experts particularly where the state of proactive and persistent culling can their advice. 2 Science in Parliament Vol 65 No 2 Whitsun 2008 OPINION Rt Hon John Denham MP Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills he Prime Minister created the HEFCE’s quality-related funding new Department for Innovation stream, and total support will amount TUniversities and Skills on his to almost £6 billion for research – first full day in office.
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