We have a science debate in 2008
The election
Recent events show there are real issues dividing the political parties on science and primary sector research which will be debated during the election campaign. Whether this will receive general publicity or seriously affect decisions by the average voter is very unlikely, but at least it is an advance on many previous elections where some major parties did not even produce a science manifesto.
Your Institute has been active in promoting this debate – you will find a report on the political forum held at Massey University, Palmerston North in July in this issue of AgScience. We also helped our Waikato section in organising their excellent initiative of asking the politicians "Does agricultural research have a future in New Zealand" on 2 October at Ruakura. We will publish extracts from this debate in the next issue of AgScience.
As far as I am aware at time of writing (29 September), only two parties have released their science policies. UnitedFuture actually scored a bit of a coup as they were first off the blocks when they announced their science manifesto at the Palmerston North forum. This picked up many of the scientists’ concerns reflected in the manifesto produced by the National Science Panel, such as the need for a national science strategy and an improvement of the inefficient funding system, the establishment of an office of a chief scientist or science council to directly advise the Prime Minister and an increase in government science funding to at least the OECD average. Interestingly, the government’s Fast Forward proposal was not mentioned, but the National Party’s decision to dump the scheme was confirmed in their recently released policy.
Both the Prime Minister and Jim Anderton, the architect of the scheme, responded very critically to National’s statement – Mr Anderton described it as the worst decision on science since Galileo was condemned by the Inquisition in 1633. National proposes to replace Fast Forward with an increased investment by government in primary sector and food research and the setting up of a virtual centre for greenhouse gas research. Members will need to read the whole policy on their website to get the full picture, but the full response from Labour will not be clear until they publish their policy.
Other initiatives in the National policy, which reflect many of the concerns of the science community, include an emphasis on improving the stability of science funding; the need to reform the overly bureaucratic funding system; and the appointment of a senior science adviser to the Prime Minister. It is important for members to carry on this debate with their candidates in this election, because I cannot recall a similar amount of interest in previous years. Moreover, several observers at the Palmerston North forum noted that the level of understanding of science issues by the politicians was far advanced on that shown by most panellists in our previous political forum at Lincoln in 2005. Hopefully we will see that improvement result in more enlightened policies for science and the primary sector in the next parliament.
National Science Panel
After a delay of more than six months (by factors outside the control of the National Science Panel) the panel’s science manifesto or plan for the recovery of New Zealand science was finally released in April. Very well attended meetings to launch the manifesto were held in Auckland, Wellington, Hamilton, Palmerston North, Christchurch (2) and Dunedin. The response was overwhelmingly favourable with the National Business Review describing it as the most important review of science in New Zealand in a decade. The main questions asked at the presentations were what next? and, how do we progress these recommendations? It was always the aim of the NSP to profile the issues during the election campaign and we can claim some success already, as many of the recommendations are included in the two parties’ science policies already published (see above). Although the panel is no longer supported financially by the Royal Society, we have decided to carry on, at least until there is real evidence of some fundamental changes in the way science is organised in this country. We are also hopeful that the Royal Society will take a more assertive role in pushing for reform. For those of you who have not read the manifesto it is still on our website www.agscience.org.nz.
Biofuels
The Canterbury section organised an excellent conference on "Biofuels – The future or a folly?" in August at Lincoln. Put together at short notice to cover this very topical subject, there was an outstanding attendance of over 150, who heard some excellent speakers including the chair of the National Science Panel, Jim Watson, and Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, Jan Wright. The proceedings will be published in the next issue of AgScience. Many thanks to John Keoghan and his team for organising this event.
The last word
At the recent negotiations on a free trade agreement with China, discussions took place on which topics should be included in a joint science programme. The Chinese were keen to see food safety on the agenda, but this was rejected by members of the New Zealand delegation as not being "jazzy" enough. It is very easy to be wise after the event, but given the recent events around contamination of dairy foods in China, perhaps it is time to revisit their proposal.
John Lancashire
President
The election
Recent events show there are real issues dividing the political parties on science and primary sector research which will be debated during the election campaign. Whether this will receive general publicity or seriously affect decisions by the average voter is very unlikely, but at least it is an advance on many previous elections where some major parties did not even produce a science manifesto.
Your Institute has been active in promoting this debate – you will find a report on the political forum held at Massey University, Palmerston North in July in this issue of AgScience. We also helped our Waikato section in organising their excellent initiative of asking the politicians "Does agricultural research have a future in New Zealand" on 2 October at Ruakura. We will publish extracts from this debate in the next issue of AgScience.
As far as I am aware at time of writing (29 September), only two parties have released their science policies. UnitedFuture actually scored a bit of a coup as they were first off the blocks when they announced their science manifesto at the Palmerston North forum. This picked up many of the scientists’ concerns reflected in the manifesto produced by the National Science Panel, such as the need for a national science strategy and an improvement of the inefficient funding system, the establishment of an office of a chief scientist or science council to directly advise the Prime Minister and an increase in government science funding to at least the OECD average. Interestingly, the government’s Fast Forward proposal was not mentioned, but the National Party’s decision to dump the scheme was confirmed in their recently released policy.
Both the Prime Minister and Jim Anderton, the architect of the scheme, responded very critically to National’s statement – Mr Anderton described it as the worst decision on science since Galileo was condemned by the Inquisition in 1633. National proposes to replace Fast Forward with an increased investment by government in primary sector and food research and the setting up of a virtual centre for greenhouse gas research. Members will need to read the whole policy on their website to get the full picture, but the full response from Labour will not be clear until they publish their policy.
Other initiatives in the National policy, which reflect many of the concerns of the science community, include an emphasis on improving the stability of science funding; the need to reform the overly bureaucratic funding system; and the appointment of a senior science adviser to the Prime Minister. It is important for members to carry on this debate with their candidates in this election, because I cannot recall a similar amount of interest in previous years. Moreover, several observers at the Palmerston North forum noted that the level of understanding of science issues by the politicians was far advanced on that shown by most panellists in our previous political forum at Lincoln in 2005. Hopefully we will see that improvement result in more enlightened policies for science and the primary sector in the next parliament.
National Science Panel
After a delay of more than six months (by factors outside the control of the National Science Panel) the panel’s science manifesto or plan for the recovery of New Zealand science was finally released in April. Very well attended meetings to launch the manifesto were held in Auckland, Wellington, Hamilton, Palmerston North, Christchurch (2) and Dunedin. The response was overwhelmingly favourable with the National Business Review describing it as the most important review of science in New Zealand in a decade. The main questions asked at the presentations were what next? and, how do we progress these recommendations? It was always the aim of the NSP to profile the issues during the election campaign and we can claim some success already, as many of the recommendations are included in the two parties’ science policies already published (see above). Although the panel is no longer supported financially by the Royal Society, we have decided to carry on, at least until there is real evidence of some fundamental changes in the way science is organised in this country. We are also hopeful that the Royal Society will take a more assertive role in pushing for reform. For those of you who have not read the manifesto it is still on our website www.agscience.org.nz.
Biofuels
The Canterbury section organised an excellent conference on "Biofuels – The future or a folly?" in August at Lincoln. Put together at short notice to cover this very topical subject, there was an outstanding attendance of over 150, who heard some excellent speakers including the chair of the National Science Panel, Jim Watson, and Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, Jan Wright. The proceedings will be published in the next issue of AgScience. Many thanks to John Keoghan and his team for organising this event.
The last word
At the recent negotiations on a free trade agreement with China, discussions took place on which topics should be included in a joint science programme. The Chinese were keen to see food safety on the agenda, but this was rejected by members of the New Zealand delegation as not being "jazzy" enough. It is very easy to be wise after the event, but given the recent events around contamination of dairy foods in China, perhaps it is time to revisit their proposal.
John Lancashire
President
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Robin Gunston – United Future Party
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Hon Pete Hodgson – Labour Party
Hon Paul Hutchison – National Party
Russel Norman – Green Party
Doug Woolerton – New Zealand First Party
Robin Gunston – United Future Party
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