Technology Strategy Board Order 2007

rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 23 November be approved. Second Report from the Statutory Instruments Committee. The noble Lord said: My Lords, in a competitive global economy, innovation and the successful exploitation of creative ideas are increasingly necessary to business success, productivity and long term economic growth. United Kingdom business is often criticised for its failure to develop and exploit to the full technology and new ideas. The Technology Strategy Board Order will help to address that problem. The order establishes the Technology Strategy Board, under the Science and Technology Act 1965. Its operational approach will, however, be very different from research councils created so far under the Act in that it will have a very strong business focus. The Act requires that a draft of the Order in Council, declaring the Technology Strategy Board to be a research council and specifying the new body’s objectives, must be laid before Parliament and approved by a resolution of each House. The draft Royal Charter under which the new body will be incorporated has been placed in the Library to provide a background to our debate. The present Technology Strategy Board has made an impressive start as an advisory body. Since October 2004, it has advised the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry on business research, technology and innovation priorities for the UK, the allocation of funding across those priorities and the most appropriate ways to support them. The board has been instrumental in the success of the Government’s technology programme. More than 600 projects have been supported, mobilising over £900 million devoted to research and development in many areas of the UK economy. The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry announced to Parliament on 1 November 2006 that he had decided that the best way to build on the success of the current board and ensure that the programme of technology support continued to be delivered efficiently and effectively was to create a new Technology Strategy Board as an executive arm’s length body. Its primary location will be Swindon. The new body will work closely with Ministers in achieving its objectives. It will promote and support research into and the development and exploitation of science, technology and new ideas for the benefit of business, in order to increase economic growth and improve quality of life in the UK through the delivery of key products and services, as agreed with the Secretary of State. The new body will have executive responsibility for delivering programmes of government financial support to encourage business investment in and use of technology across all sectors of the UK economy. These programmes will include continuing support for collaborative research and development for business investment, and the use of technology, in both manufacturing and service industries. The aim will be to achieve increased innovation in sectors where the UK economy is strong; the development of new sectors, through the creation and growth of research and development, of intensive small and medium-sized enterprises; and support for the use of technology in areas important to the future of existing and emerging sectors in the UK. The Technology Strategy Board will also support knowledge transfer networks. These are national over-arching networks that aim to improve the UK’s innovation performance by increasing the breadth and depth of knowledge transfer of technology into UK businesses. The establishment of the new body will provide improved strategic focus, better operational flexibility, and greater consistency and coherence in the delivery of the Government’s programme of technology support. The new body will be business focussed, with a business-led board. It will work closely with departments and agencies of Her Majesty’s Government, with the devolved administrations, the regional development agencies and the research councils. It will collaborate with these bodies and businesses on technological developments and innovations of importance to the UK and to government procurement. A key role of the new body will be to support close working between Her Majesty’s Government and business in developing and exploiting new technologies through its programmes. In its advisory role, the new body will alert the Government to areas where barriers exist to the exploitation of new technologies. It may be asked to make recommendations on how those barriers can be removed, but responsibility for the overall direction of innovation policy will remain with Ministers. These proposals were subject to informal consultation in the middle of this year and they received wide support from key stakeholders, including the devolved administrations, the regional development agencies and the CBI. There was general support for delivery of the board’s remit at arm’s length from central government. It was felt that an arm’s length relationship would provide a stronger focus and greater effectiveness in delivery and clearer accountabilities for performance. Stakeholders also believed that such a relationship would enhance the influence of the Technology Strategy Board across the Government. Graham Spittle, the present chair of the Technology Strategy Board, has agreed to chair the new body. That will help to ensure that the successful work of the board is carried forward through the transition period. Mr Spittle has a tremendous record of driving innovation in business and I greatly appreciate the leadership that he has provided to the Technology Strategy Board in its current form. All contracts, assets and liabilities to be transferred from the Department of Trade and Industry to the new Technology Strategy Board will occur under the terms of a further order made under the Science and Technology Act 1965, under the negative resolution procedure. I expect the new body to be formally inaugurated in the first half of the 2007-08 financial year. I beg to move. Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 23 November be approved. Second report from the Statutory Instruments Committee.—(Lord Truscott.)