The UK government needs better scientific advice and should improve the way it communicates levels of risk to the public, a parliamentary committee said this week.
The report from the House of Commons Select Committee on Science and Technology urges the government to set up a new government scientific service, give more power to science advisers, and improve long term policy planning. It also wants negative attitudes towards scientific qualifications to be tackled.
The committee, which last year launched its inquiry into the government's handling of scientific advice, risk, and evidence in policy making, makes 69 recommendations, including the setting up of an advisory network that would include all relevant professional bodies.
It also wants a scale of risks adopted by all government departments when alerting the public to levels of danger so that concern can be kept in perspective.
“Science and technology play such an important part in so many policy questions today, they need to be better embedded in the policy making process,” said the committee's chairman, Phil Willis. “We need to be able to feel confident that when the government talks of evidence based policy this is backed up by sound scientific research. At present this does not always appear to be the case.”
The committee recommends that the role of government chief scientific adviser be split from that of head of the Office of Science and Innovation and wants to see the job based in the Cabinet Office, with the post holder having a seat on the Treasury board. It also recommends that all future departmental chief scientific advisers be externally appointed people who have held senior jobs in their areas.
It also calls for a government scientific service to guarantee a high level of scientific expertise. “Since the disbanding of the scientific civil service, there has been insufficient action to strengthen the position of scientists and engineers as a professional group within the civil service,” the committee's report says.
The report, which describes the institutional structure of the scientific advisory system in the United States as attractive, also raises concerns about the status of science.
It cites anecdotal evidence, given by the government's chief scientific adviser, David King, that people in more general civil service jobs were hiding their scientific skills because they were seen as an impediment to promotion.
“It is worrying and regrettable that there is a perception that not only has there been a decline in scientific expertise within the civil service, but civil servants perceive specialist skills to be a hindrance to career progression,” says the report.
It says that the government should tackle negative attitudes towards scientific qualifications and the misconception that scientists in the civil service should be “on tap, not on top.”
The MPs also want “horizon scanning” to be a fundamental part of the policy making process.
Supplementary Material
Scientific Advice, Risk and Evidence Based Policy Making is accessible at www.parliament.uk.
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