A contact passes on to me news of an extraordinary email that could be perceived as referendum voting instructions from a University bigwig to his staff and faculty.
The Principal of Queen Mary College, University of London, Simon Gaskell, sent a "Dear Colleague" email out in March. It starts even-handedly: "As a university, we encourage our staff and students to contribute to this debate, to express their views and most importantly to vote."
However it then goes on to state clearly to staff how their employer will be voting "QMSE [Queen Mary Senior Executive] holds the view that membership of the EU is beneficial to our success ... For example, EU membership facilitates staff and student mobility, with 10% of students and nearly 20% of staff at QMUL being nationals of other EU countries." It goes on to state the "benefit" of EU membership and continues: "Colleagues will consider for themselves the potential impact of withdrawal on this institution and also weigh this factor alongside a range of other considerations when determining how to vote."
It is difficult to know what to make of this latter sentence, on the face of it it is a neutral exhortation, but given the paean to the EU that preceded it, some staff have taken it (rightly or wrongly) as a veiled threat from their employer. Don't rock the boat!
I have a suspicion that similar communications have been going out across the land as employers with a vested interest in remaining tighten the screws and ramp up Project Fear. Do you want to keep your job?
Monday, June 6, 2016
Sunday, June 5, 2016
Britain's immensely strong scientific culture has been weakened in the EU
Doom and gloom about post-BREXIT UK science is all around us. But it has mainly come from the FRS club, Vice-Chancellors and science administrators. Rank and file scientists have hardly been heard. Why? What is going on?
This blog will try to explain how some people benefit from the bureaucratisation of science, but the health of British science does not.
British Science can best excel outside the EU.
Picture: ETH Zurich, the only European University in the 'world top 20' (outside Britain). How does non-EU Switzerland manage such scientific excellence when we are told how essential EU membership is to our scientific future? Could the uncomfortable truth be that membership of the EU does not make for scientific excellence and may actually hinder it?
(1) Britain has a strong scientific culture that is independent of the EU.
A recent article in the New Scientist (4 June 2016) by Chris Leigh of Scientists for Britain points out that the UK publishes 15% of the world's most highly cited papers. The only EU universities to make the world's top 20 are British. Britain's scientific excellence is despite political union with the EU, not because of it. The foundation of Britain's scientific excellence was laid by Newton and Hooke, not by a treaty in 1972.
(2) Britain's science is threatened by the EU.
One of the reasons for the weakness of much of EU science, compared to Britain’s, is a scientific culture that is inward looking, unimaginative and nepotistic. Don't take my word for it: there are plenty of articles out there saying the same. [“Italian scientists protest 'serious neglect' of research” (Science, 2016); “Why plagiarism is such a problem for German PhDs” (retractionwatch.com, 2016); “Why French politics and science don't mix” (Nature Materials, 2004); “Something rotten in the state of Spain, say whistleblowers” (Times Higher Education, 2012) ….etc, etc].
The problem for Britain of buying into the European scientific bureaucracy is that we weaken the UK's own scientific culture - a culture that has been so successful in the past. Furthermore, forcing UK scientists into European partnerships means that we neglect the partnerships that really matter, those with North America. I've lately noticed fewer and fewer UK scientists at conferences in the USA, as the European conference burden increases. This is truly dangerous as the real global powerhouse of science is still the USA. From where I stand, European science begins to look increasingly parochial as it draws in on itself.
(3) But hang on, don't we get our science funding from the EU now? Leaving the EU would mean that we won't have money to do science.
Not so. A recent Royal Society Report noted that only 3% of the UK's R&D spend came from the EU. And it's our money anyway. British scientists are very good at applying to get it back, and then some, but the problem is that we have to get it back on terms dictated by the EU science bureaucracy. We can't necessarily spend it in ways that that would make strategic sense for British science.
(4) But surely the EU guarantees the quality and strategic importance of it’s science spend?
Hmm. I've spoken to a lot of UK scientists who have grave misgivings about the scientific quality of the EU scientific networks. There is a definite sense that networks are a means of scattering Euros around Europe to give everyone a slice of the pie. Some of the science is, arguably, marginal. On the face of it, this may seem like a mean-spirited thing to say, but many scientists privately admit to the truth of this. Examine your conscience and say it ain’t so.
(5) If Britain gets so little scientific benefit from political union, why do so many scientific bigwigs support “Remain”?
Why indeed? Buying into the European scientific machinery creates “big bureaucracy”, “big gravy" “big committees" and doubtless “big expense accounts". I dare say that some scientific bigwigs can thrive on this. However, what it doesn't create is “big science".
(6) Now I've got you! That has to be wrong. Look at CERN and the EU’s Large Hadron Collider. That is big science by the EU and for the EU.
Rubbish unfortunately. The Large Hadron Collider is an international project funded by (and involving scientists from) 100 countries. It is physically located partially outside the EU, in Switzerland. The USA alone has provided half a billion dollars of funding and has 750 scientists working on it. Science is international, it doesn't live hermetically sealed in a box labelled “EU" however attractive that would be to eurocrats.
For British science to thrive we need an independent scientific culture of uncompromising excellence with an outlook that is truly global. The procrustean bed of euro-sci is rapidly ripping and crushing that away. We have to take back control, we should vote OUT on 23 June 2016.
This blog will try to explain how some people benefit from the bureaucratisation of science, but the health of British science does not.
British Science can best excel outside the EU.
Picture: ETH Zurich, the only European University in the 'world top 20' (outside Britain). How does non-EU Switzerland manage such scientific excellence when we are told how essential EU membership is to our scientific future? Could the uncomfortable truth be that membership of the EU does not make for scientific excellence and may actually hinder it?(1) Britain has a strong scientific culture that is independent of the EU.
A recent article in the New Scientist (4 June 2016) by Chris Leigh of Scientists for Britain points out that the UK publishes 15% of the world's most highly cited papers. The only EU universities to make the world's top 20 are British. Britain's scientific excellence is despite political union with the EU, not because of it. The foundation of Britain's scientific excellence was laid by Newton and Hooke, not by a treaty in 1972.
(2) Britain's science is threatened by the EU.
One of the reasons for the weakness of much of EU science, compared to Britain’s, is a scientific culture that is inward looking, unimaginative and nepotistic. Don't take my word for it: there are plenty of articles out there saying the same. [“Italian scientists protest 'serious neglect' of research” (Science, 2016); “Why plagiarism is such a problem for German PhDs” (retractionwatch.com, 2016); “Why French politics and science don't mix” (Nature Materials, 2004); “Something rotten in the state of Spain, say whistleblowers” (Times Higher Education, 2012) ….etc, etc].
The problem for Britain of buying into the European scientific bureaucracy is that we weaken the UK's own scientific culture - a culture that has been so successful in the past. Furthermore, forcing UK scientists into European partnerships means that we neglect the partnerships that really matter, those with North America. I've lately noticed fewer and fewer UK scientists at conferences in the USA, as the European conference burden increases. This is truly dangerous as the real global powerhouse of science is still the USA. From where I stand, European science begins to look increasingly parochial as it draws in on itself.
(3) But hang on, don't we get our science funding from the EU now? Leaving the EU would mean that we won't have money to do science.
Not so. A recent Royal Society Report noted that only 3% of the UK's R&D spend came from the EU. And it's our money anyway. British scientists are very good at applying to get it back, and then some, but the problem is that we have to get it back on terms dictated by the EU science bureaucracy. We can't necessarily spend it in ways that that would make strategic sense for British science.
(4) But surely the EU guarantees the quality and strategic importance of it’s science spend?
Hmm. I've spoken to a lot of UK scientists who have grave misgivings about the scientific quality of the EU scientific networks. There is a definite sense that networks are a means of scattering Euros around Europe to give everyone a slice of the pie. Some of the science is, arguably, marginal. On the face of it, this may seem like a mean-spirited thing to say, but many scientists privately admit to the truth of this. Examine your conscience and say it ain’t so.
(5) If Britain gets so little scientific benefit from political union, why do so many scientific bigwigs support “Remain”?
Why indeed? Buying into the European scientific machinery creates “big bureaucracy”, “big gravy" “big committees" and doubtless “big expense accounts". I dare say that some scientific bigwigs can thrive on this. However, what it doesn't create is “big science".
(6) Now I've got you! That has to be wrong. Look at CERN and the EU’s Large Hadron Collider. That is big science by the EU and for the EU.
Rubbish unfortunately. The Large Hadron Collider is an international project funded by (and involving scientists from) 100 countries. It is physically located partially outside the EU, in Switzerland. The USA alone has provided half a billion dollars of funding and has 750 scientists working on it. Science is international, it doesn't live hermetically sealed in a box labelled “EU" however attractive that would be to eurocrats.
For British science to thrive we need an independent scientific culture of uncompromising excellence with an outlook that is truly global. The procrustean bed of euro-sci is rapidly ripping and crushing that away. We have to take back control, we should vote OUT on 23 June 2016.
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