According to Innovation News Network, the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee has declared the UK’s failure to scale science and technology companies a full-blown crisis in their new report titled “Bleeding to Death: The Science and Technology Growth Emergency.” Committee Chair Lord Mair stated the UK has experienced sluggish productivity growth and near-flat real wages since the global financial crisis, calling the inability to retain economic benefits from R&D a “fatal flaw” in any growth strategy. The committee warns that without urgent and radical reform, the government risks acting too late to address long-standing failures. They’re calling for clearer leadership from the Prime Minister and Chancellor through a new National Council for Science, Technology and Growth, plus immediate reforms to counterproductive visa policies and pension fund investment rules.
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The bleeding is real
This isn’t just another government report gathering dust. The language here is unusually stark – “bleeding to death,” “fatal flaw,” “crisis point.” When Lords committees start talking like this, you know things are genuinely bad. The UK has this weird pattern of being brilliant at research and discovery but absolutely terrible at turning those breakthroughs into sustainable companies that stay in the country. We’re basically running a world-class R&D program for other countries’ benefit.
Where are the big ideas?
The committee isn’t messing around with small tweaks. They want consolidation of public investment bodies like Innovate UK and the British Business Bank into a single entity that can actually compete with sovereign wealth funds. They’re calling for pension funds to be basically forced to invest in UK tech through measures like clawbacks on tax reliefs. And they want public procurement to deliberately funnel contracts to innovative UK SMEs, copying the US SBIR model that’s been wildly successful across the pond.
Visas and talent drain
Here’s the thing that really gets me – the UK keeps saying it wants to be a science superpower while making it ridiculously hard for talented scientists and entrepreneurs to actually come here. The committee nails it: when global talent wants to move to your country, you should be rolling out the red carpet, not red tape. We’re basically telling the world’s best and brightest “we’d love to have you, but please fill out these 47 forms and wait six months.” Meanwhile, other countries are actually making it easy.
Can this actually fix things?
The full report makes a compelling case, but the real question is whether any government will actually implement these recommendations. We’ve seen similar warnings before, followed by… not much. The committee says challenges can be overcome with “decisive and speedy action” from the Prime Minister and Chancellor. But let’s be honest – when was the last time we saw decisive and speedy action on anything in UK science policy? The potential is enormous, but so is the bureaucratic inertia. Basically, we’ll know this is being taken seriously when we see actual legislation and budget commitments, not just another task force or advisory group.
