Spring Budget outlines funding for UK science

During the 2017 Spring Budget, chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond outlined plans to help the UK’s science and innovation industries.

The announcement comes following the chancellor’s Autumn statement, which detailed a £23 billion innovation fund to drive up the UK’s productivity.

Hammond detailed how some of that money will be spent to help the UK excel in a number of industries. The funding includes; £300 million for research talent, along with 1,000 PhD places for science, technology, engineering and mathematics subjects; £270 million for robots, driverless cars and biotech; £16m for a 5G mobile technology hub and £200 million for fibre broadband.

As part of the Spring Budget 2017, the government stated it will: “invest in cutting-edge technology and innovation, so Britain continues to be at the forefront of the global technology revolution.”

Speaking to TechCity News before the budget, Dr. Jamie Graves, the CEO and founder of Scottish cybersecurity firm ZoneFox said: “What I really want to see from this Spring Budget is far more money committed to the tech sector and far more detail about how it will be spent. The UK doesn’t need any more ‘strategic digital plans’ – we need tangible results to help us move forward.”

Mike Thompson, CEO of Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) welcomed aspects of the chancellor's announcement but highlighted the missed opportunity to announce measures to make the medicines and treatments developed and discovered in Britain, made available to UK patients.

A recent report commissioned by APBI revealed that in 2015, UK life sciences contributed £30.7 billion to the economy providing an estimated tax contribution of £8.6 billion to the exchequer.

The sector supports a total of 482,000 jobs in the UK, with every life sciences job supporting 2.5 jobs elsewhere.