Watch out for the House of Lords debate on Engineering Biology on Mon 28 AprilĀ This topic and some of the issues raised are highly relevant to EBNet, and we are considering whether to draft a position statement on the role of Engineering Biology in Environmental Biotechnology.
More details:
The House of Lords will debate the Lords Science and Technology Committeeās recent report Donāt fail to scale: seizing the opportunity of Engineering Biology on Monday 28 April at around 17:30. You can watch the debate live or after on Parliamentlive.tv – Lords Grand Committee.
Peers from across the House will be pressing Science Minister Lord Vallance on precisely what steps the Government will take ā and when – having concluded that without immediate and coordinated action, the UK risks falling further behind other nations in engineering biology, particularly the US, despite its world-class expertise.
The Committeeās report called for bold leadership and decisive steps to harness the full potential of engineering biology. Among its key findings were that the UKās approach lacked coherence and commitment, while current visa policies constrained the UK’s ability to attract top international talent. The UK faced a ‘valley of death’ in funding, where early-stage investments are available but scale-up capital was scarce.
A significant number of peers will take part, and Baroness Brown (who led the Committeeās inquiry) will be press the minister on the Governmentās intentions. The current chair of the Committee, Lord Mair, will be among the speakers, alongside three former Science Ministers: Viscount Camrose, Lord Willetts, and Lord Drayson. A full list of speakers is here.