Science and tech committee reborn

Liberal Democrat MP Phil Willis will lead the committee

The re-establishment of a parliamentary Science and Technology Committee was approved on Thursday.

The committee will be made up of the same members as the existing Innovation, Universities, Skills, and Science Committee (IUSS).

Some MPs recently raised concerns that government science policy would be marginalised in the new Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS).

The committee will take over its new role when Parliament sits in October.

Lord Drayson, Minister for Science and Innovation, said of the move: "Effective oversight of the use of science across government is important. I look forward to working with the Select Committee in supporting a dynamic science and research base."

Initial calls for a re-establishment of the Science and Technology Committee, which was abolished in 2007, came from a report by IUSS, suggesting that science "could be lost in a black hole" in what the committee chairman Phil Willis called the "all-encompassing super department" of BIS.

The Campaign for Science and Engineering (Case) welcomed the decision. Case director Nick Dusic said: "Today's decision showed that there is strong support for proper scrutiny of science and engineering within Parliament.

"[This] corrects the mistake made in 2007 of abolishing the Committee."

Institute of Physics chief executive Robert Kirby-Harris said he was delighted that the identity of the "very effective" IUSS committee would be maintained in the new body.