14 December 2011
by Barry McKeown
In the Autumn Statement by the Chancellor much information had previously been disclosed especially concerning the new National Infrastructure Plan relating to Broadband, however, I would draw the readers’ attention to two key technologies that he identified namely: supercomputing and satellite technology.
The third aspect identified was the creation of a world-beating animal health laboratory is an issue for others but the issue now appears to me to be how the Chancellor can be held to account for these technology pledges and what these words actually represent especially given that the Chancellor identified Graphene in his previous Conservative party conference address indicating that he would fund a national research program “that will take this Nobel Prize-winning discovery from British laboratory to British factory floor”.
Unfortunately his position was subsequently slightly undermined somewhat in the FT on the 31st October by the two Nobel Laureates’, Andre Geim and Kostya Novoselov, setting out their position and decrying the nature of the investment opportunity and what the real situation is and what is actually required for state investment in practice.
Accordingly I was disappointed that the FT has not picked up on these words, so far, and the financial and economic repercussions.
The subject of supercomputing I shall leave for the moment but I shall return to the subject of satellites and the role of the Select Committee on CMS report on Spectrum that is of relevance here in the next posting.
However, I would also draw the readers’ attention to a little known announcement from the Cabinet Office on cyber security strategy and the potential technology release and role to be played by HMGCHQ that was slipped out on the 25th November regarding the protection on the national infrastructure that is shortly to be put in place.
For completeness the full extract from the Autumn Statement from Hansard : 29th Nov : Col 807 reads:
“Government should not assume that this will happen by itself. We must help businesses to grow and succeed, and we can do that at a national level too, with our commitment, for example, to British science. At a time of difficult choices, we made ours last year when we committed to protect the science budget. Today we are confirming almost half a billion pounds for scientific projects, from supercomputing and satellite technology to a world-beating animal health laboratory, and Government can encourage many more of our small firms to export overseas for the first time. We are doubling to 50,000 the number of SMEs we are helping, and extending support to British mid-caps, who sometimes lack the overseas ambition of their German equivalents.”
Bookmark with:
