TALK of a national energy research centre is in the air again. So I asked Prime Minister Tony Blair about the proposals, which I hear he and David King, the government鈥檚 Chief Scientific Adviser, set great store by.
Blair said the Department for Trade and Industry leads the field on this matter. Establishing such a centre was a key recommendation in last autumn鈥檚 review 鈥� led by King 鈥� of government support for energy research. Like all recommendations in that review it was incorporated into a wider review of energy policy and published on 14 February by the Performance and Innovation Unit, which analyses major policy issues for government departments and designs strategic solutions. The government will set out its response to that report in a White Paper later in the year, said the Prime Minister.
Blair went on to say that in the meantime, the research councils are developing detailed proposals for an energy research centre in consultation with King and other interested parties. These will form part of a broader proposal for sustainable energy research. I have since learned that emphasis is likely to be given to energy efficiency, hydrogen production and storage, CO2 sequestration, nuclear power (and in particular nuclear waste), solar photovoltaics, and wave and tidal power. Any reader with a special interest in these matters should write to King as soon as possible.
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IN THE recent cabinet reshuffle, Tony Blair moved Hilary Benn from International Development to the Home Office as junior prisons minister. It must have been something of a surprise, therefore, for Benn to find he was also being given Angela Eagle鈥檚 former responsibility for licensing animals for research purposes. One of the first things to turn up in Benn鈥檚 new ministerial in-tray would have been the request from Norman Baker, MP for Lewes, that the annual statistics published as required by the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act, include the number of animals bred for experimental purposes but not used. Baker had originally asked Eagle about this.
Up to now the Home Office has set its face against including this sort of information. As Eagle told Baker, the Animal Procedures Committee viewed the matter as part of its 10-year review of the Act. It concluded that over-breeding could be minimised. The committee was drawing up some 鈥減rinciples of best practice鈥� to achieve this and was liaising with the Laboratory Animal Science Association. I hear that Benn can expect to receive this report very soon.
If a way can be found to avoid breeding too many animals for research, so much the better. But not, I hope, to the detriment of medical research.
IAN HALLIDAY, the Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council鈥檚 chief executive, says that the European Space Agency has plans for a new high-profile programme in planetary exploration (New Statesman, 20 May, p 32). He contends that the Beagle 2 鈥渆xobiology lander鈥� 鈥� Britain鈥檚 contribution to the European Space Agency鈥檚 Mars Express mission, to be launched in 2003 鈥� shows that with ambition and enterprise Britain can play a leading role in developing the sort of technology needed to look for life on other planets. I asked Lord Sainsbury, the science minister for his view of this.
Sainsbury said that ESA鈥檚 Aurora programme is an exciting new opportunity that will aim to pave the way for a European to set foot on Mars by 2025. It provides a positive impetus for Britain to be involved in examining samples from the red planet in the follow-up to Beagle 2. The government is happy for Britain to contribute to ESA programmes whenever the results could further our knowledge of the Solar System: the Aurora programme belongs to this category.
