The HoC Science and Technology committee investigate BAS / NOC and NERC

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[This is a post bringing together things I have done elsewhere whilst learning how to use this platform.]

I am a huge fan of the Natural Environment Research Council, and used to work for the British Antarctic Survey. It is a fact that in the UK at the moment the community has some very tough funding decisions to make.

NERC decided to investigate  saving money through a possible merger of the National Oceanography Centre and BAS.  It is fair to say that  this was not so well recieved.

Observer news story

The story in the Observer

The result was the The House of commons Science and Technology committee conducted a session to investigate the merger on 31 October 2012. I live tweeted the session and put together a storify with lots of background info. You can read that here:

 

 

To me it is clear there were a few some strong supporters of a merger, but the people against were extremely vocal. That meant the in my view some of the issues were not addressed. Overall the reporting included the worst hyperbole and it’s obvious to me that if anything like this is considered again, then the approach by the organisations is going to be quite different.

2 thoughts on “The HoC Science and Technology committee investigate BAS / NOC and NERC”

  1. Jim

    I agree that the potential benefits of the merger have unfortunately been lost in the shouting. However, the fact remains that NERC did not present a sufficiently strong case: they argued that the driver was financial, yet when pressed on figures, the saving involved was only ~£0.5 million per year, across two institutions with a combined annual budget of >£70 million. And for that <1% cost saving, the "brand name" of BAS would be lost; in business, such a decision would be crazy.

    The criticisms of the Select Committee also focused on *how* NERC went about the process, as seen by comments in their report such as:

    "The decision to merge appeared to have been taken in advance of the consultation"

    "Serious concerns regarding whether NERC has the competence to take decisions that potentially have such geopolitically significant consequences"

    "questions about whether Professor Hill is the most appropriate person to run the consultation and merger"

    "NERC should ensure that future changes are conducted with better engagement with scientists, this Committee and other stakeholders"

    …rather than the potential benefits or otherwise that a merger could provide. In particular, they pointed out that it could be considered a bit dodgy for NOC Director and then BAS Interim Director Ed Hill to be in charge of a consultation on the merger of NOC and BAS, given that such a merger would create a bigger job for himself. Now I don't doubt Prof Hill's integrity, but you can see the point that the Select Committee were raising, given outcry about standards in public life elsewhere. At best, the process followed was indeed naive.

    NERC has to accept its own failure in how it approached and ran the process, and hopefully learn from it. Scientists always moan about Research Councils (a population stereotypic response to occasional rejection of grant proposals!), but trust among the scientific community that NERC serves has been eroded by this, and NERC must work to rebuild that trust.

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    1. London_MarcusB

      Excellent and well considered comment. Thanks for taking the time.

      I am nodding vigorously a lot at what you say. I would make a couple of comments: I am sure they said the BAS brand would not go (I am sure that’s in the consult document, as well as stated in the committee), also whilst savings now are so small as to be in the noise, in five years’ time would that be the case?

      Finally, there are scientists in the community who agreed with a merger. They were (generally) quiet in the process.

      Also totally agree about NERC. We are NERC and we are the science community. NERC has learned already. It’s a shame it was such a public way to learn though.

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