Speeches by Dixon.

“Good morning. I should probably declare that I sat as an adviser on the UKRI healthy ageing challenge fund, which completed in 2024 and oversaw £98 million of grants, mainly through the Innovate UK-type of work. You have both outlined a number of areas for which UKRI is responsible. If you were to do a SWOT analysis, w…”

“We have covered quite a lot about two of the three buckets: the curiosity-driven basic research and the research that is aligned to Government ambition on the missions. The third area is around investment to support innovative businesses. In the pre-panel, we heard quite a lot about some of the challenges around invest…”

“So the long-term ambition would be to have that £20 billion.”

“Is there any interest from other Government Departments? You mentioned that a lot of money is spent on R&D, and given out in grants, that does not come directly from UKRI. In health, the NIHR is obviously a huge funder. Are the platforms that you are developing going to be taken up so that there will be the ability, in…”

“What would your benefit realisation be? Can you describe some of the benefits that you hope will come from this work? You talked about producing your annual accounts more effectively. I know accounting officers will be very pleased about that, and I am sure that we and the Auditor General will be too, but what other be…”

“George Freeman touched on this, but I want to come back to the data analytical capabilities that you are obviously about to go live with. I realise that you are a bit nervous about speaking too much about it, Siobhan, but let us look ahead, say, five years. What data and analytical powers do you think the UK will need …”

“So in the short term, it does not sound like AI is going to be replacing the expert peer reviewer.”

“Will that be reflected in the metrics to show how many businesses are scaling up—metrics around getting businesses out of their early R&D stage and into being sustainable businesses?”

“How do you work with DBT to make sure that the wider investment ecosystem will take the hopefully more investment-ready businesses that will come out of what UKRI described, so that they scale up and we grow UK plc in terms of both money and jobs?”

“I am delighted because the healthy ageing challenge, given social care commissioning and local authorities, was an absolute disaster for any of these small businesses coming through. They just did not have a customer and there was not an outcomes-based commissioner at the other end who could adopt the technologies. Tha…”

“Can I double check that it will not only have the very narrow economic growth impact measures, but recognise that, for some of the missions, we are looking for social as well as economic impact?”

“I will mention again my conflict of interest, I suppose, but also the insights that I gained by being on the advisory board of one of the challenge funds on healthy ageing, which is linked to the last Government’s original industrial strategy. There was an evaluation, and part of the advisory group’s role was to help U…”

“That is true about skills and capacity, because at the moment there are bits in every university, and we have loads of catapults scattered around. There is quite a lot of that in-support infrastructure to make commercialisation possible, which again seems a bit fragmented—would you agree?”

“So in a sense, once there is clarity, rather than making them compete, it is more about making an investment decision.”

“Professor Boyle, I think you touched on this earlier in response to the Chair’s questions when discussing Innovate UK and scaling and growing commercially. Do you think that UKRI is strategic enough in how it is using its funding to achieve that? From what you were saying before, you have talked about the business link…”

“Is there anything else you want to raise on strengths and weaknesses?”

“Professor Boyle, do you agree that UKRI strikes that balance? Are there other areas of weakness? We have evidence that it might be a bit bureaucratic, and slow to make decisions.”

“We have received some evidence that highlights the issue of a narrowing of focus, in this case on to the Government’s missions, as opposed to having responsive or open calls that would allow more researcher-led applications. Is that what you meant by “focused”?”

“I recognise this issue, because many of my local independent shops in Bingley have been victims of crime, particularly by aggressive scammers demanding money. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is vital that independent shops not only feel confident about reporting the crime, but know that the police will respond and th…”

“Shipley Market Square in my constituency is having a major facelift, but to attract shoppers back into the town centre we know that we need to make it safe. I commend my local officers, Inspector Tany Ditta and his team, for the amazing work they do. Will my hon. Friend join me in recognising that the Labour Government…”