UK government upholds £20 billion commitment to research and development
But a longer-term pledge of £22 billion has quietly disappeared in Jeremy Hunt’s first autumn statement as chancellor
The UK government is maintaining its commitment to science and research with a promise to spend £20 billion a year on it by 2024–25. ‘This is the largest increase in R&D spend ever over a spending review period,’ it stated in its autumn statement, the first one delivered by Jeremy Hunt as chancellor.
‘[It’s] very good, particularly in the present circumstances,’ summarised Paul Nurse, director of the Francis Crick Institute. ‘There was a lot of concern that [the government] would go back on the commitment to go to £20 billion,’ says Kieron Flanagan, professor of science and technology policy at the University of Manchester. ‘We are pleased that the government has recognised UK science has a vital role to play in our economic recovery and the net zero transition,’ agreed the Royal Society of Chemistry’s head of policy and evidence Tanya Sheridan.