Rupert's Read

In the wake of the very tenuous 'success' of the just-concluded Cancun climate conference (see http://liberalconspiracy.org/2010/12/15/why-climate-talks-in-cancun-failed-miserably/ ), it is more important than ever to think about why the human race seems to be failing so miserably to address this existential challenge to civilisation on Earth. I have a suggestion as to why, and a suggestion as to what we can do about it. Let me begin with this very thoughtful post that carefully makes the argument that those opposing serious action on dangerous climate-change eerily echo the arguments of those who opposed serious action to stop slavery. It points out for example the striking parallels that exist between the arguments of the capitalists who called for only voluntary action to reduce the negative impact of slavery, and the arguments of the capitalists who call now for only voluntary action to reduce the negative impact of manmade climate change. But I believe that ...

A week after the tuition fees debacle, here's my take on British politics, and on the exciting possibility now presenting itself: http://brightgreenscotland.org/index.php/2010/12/the-beginning-of-the-end-of-the-libdems ...Is this where British politics goes from here, post-fees? Let me know what you think, and whether you agree with my diagnosis or not. [Do comment at the BGS site, rather than here. ]  

http://climatevoices.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/rights-versus-markets-the-heart-of-the-debate-in-cancun/ An important piece, on the mark. Although of course nature does not have 'rights' - it is silly (though understandable) to try to turn nature into an Enligtenment-style juridical subject. But nature more obviously does have (to use Lakoff's term, or Marshall Rosenberg's) needs - and limits...

Neal Lawson's and John Harris's major piece in the NEW STATESMAN recently, "The paradigm shift", lays out a reasonably-ambitious set of ideas for a genuinely revamped policy programme for Labour under Ed Miliband's leadership, that Lawson and Harris call "New Socialism". There are important omissions (e.g. there is much talk of manmade climate change and even of questioning the desirability of further economic growth, but no mention of the concomitant and vital issue of the preservation of biodiversity; and there is surprisingly little commitment to a far more equal society,   a la   Wilkinson and Pickett, that could be achieved by a mixture of much more progressive taxation and equal 'carbon rations'); but the direction of travel is certainly welcome. What Lawson and Harris are recommending sounds, in other words, like at the least a sort of 'lite' version of the Green Party manifesto.     If the policy reviews that Mr. ...

This, from THE SUN today, reporting the latest YOUGOV poll - which puts the LibDems on 8% !!!!!!!

Proud to be one of the signatories of this letter, published in today's _Guardian_: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/dec/10/get-off-learn-to-earn-treadmill  Have a read, and then do pass it on.

    Businesses in Bowthorpe Road, Norwich, call for rethink on crossing plans   Norwich City Council was to begin work on a new £50,000 zebra crossing at Bowthorpe Road in the new year. But the proposals have alarmed the owners of four businesses because they include the loss of parking spaces. Now the traders have grouped together and submitted a 231-signature petition to the council calling on it to rethink the plans, and the authority has announced a fresh consultation after coming up with a second proposal, so that both options can be considered. Lisa Holmes, a co-partner at Merry-Go-Round, on the corner of Bond Street, said even the revised proposal would cause problems for customers, and she said the petition showed the strength of feeling about the plans, dwarfing a previous 38-signature petition sent in my supporters of the ...

Compass's decision last weekend to look seriously over the next two months at opening up its full membership (see http://www.compassonline.org.uk/news/item.asp?n=11722  ) is very welcome. This in effect responds to the call I made - http://www.leftfootforward.org/2010/07/compass-must-practice-what-it-preaches-on-pluralism/  - and gives real hope that a 'progressive alliance' can be built that could take this country in a different direction over the next 5 years. If there is another balanced Parliament after the 2015 General Election, we need to make sure that we are ready to have something else replace the ConDem government. Compass pluralising could be a key basis for being ready in that way: and would also fit well with the new political environment that will evolve in this country if the AV referendum is passed (See here for why: http://liberalconspiracy.org/2010/06/28/why-the-left-will-always-be-at-a-loss-without-vote-reform/  .). As a Green who is a ...

The following is a statement release by the occupying students of UEA. I understand that about 20 of them are occupying the Council House: "We are occupying to support the cause of free education and in opposition to all public sector cuts. This is a peaceful occupation and we do not intend to damage the building or its contents. The occupation is in solidarity with all facing increasing fees or cuts in their workplaces and/or services. However we do not claim to represent anyone else. We also apologise if we have interrupted or inconvenienced anyone by our actions. The occupation is orchestrated to coincide with Aaron Porter's visit to campus and we acknowledge his stance in favour of peaceful direct action."

Check out my friend and colleague Andrew Boswell, in an excellent post on the Transition Norwich blog today: http://transitionnorwich.blogspot.com/2010/12/inspector-runs-rule-on-high-carbon.html

Well well well... Scroll through these latest Wikileaks disclosures, and you will learn something interesting about East Anglia's own leading LibDem MP, and Simon Wright's guru, Norman Lamb: He self-identifies as right-wing... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11883310 This may come as something of a surprise and even a shock to the majority of LibDem voters, including Lamb's constituents: who self-identify as left-of-centre. It may be even less welcome news to Labour voters who tactically voted to keep the Tories out in North Norfolk. It just goes to show once again - what everyone is now realising - that a vote for the LibDems is a vote for the Right of British politics, not the centre or the left, let alone for greens... In other words: If you want to vote Right-wing, then vote ConDem (LibDem or Tory). If you want to cast a green vote, then the only way of doing so is voting Green.

Go Caroline!: GREEN MP SPONSORS AMENDMENT CALLING ON LIB DEMS TO HONOUR PLEDGE OVER STUDENT FEES ...AND REGRETTING LABOUR'S ROLE IN INTRODUCING TUITION FEES IN THE FIRST PLACE Caroline Lucas, Britain's first Green MP, today sponsors an amendment to an opposition motion on tuition fees in an effort to toughen-up Labour's critique and call to account Liberal Democrat MPs who have failed to honour their pledge to oppose increases in tuition fees. Today sees an Opposition Day debate on school sports funding and then tuition fees (1). Labour leader Ed Milliband has put forward what the Greens regard as a weak motion (2) calling on the government to publish its education plans in detail and expressing concern over student debt. The Green Party leader, together with MPs from the Scottish and Welsh nationalist parties, has tabled an amendment (3) spelling out a much tougher critique of the government, noting Labour's role in introducing tuition fees in the first place, and call...

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Major Policy Reviews will be announced today by Labour (see http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/miliband-vows-to-move-beyond-new-labour-2144989.html  ) including in unconventional "areas" such as 'Time-poorness' and 'Loneliness'. This is a dramatic development; it partly explains why Miliband's team came out in favour of Cameron's stuff about 'quality of life' the other day. Labour's tentative sidling away from its standard pro-growth agenda (see already here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11851318  ) is an opportunity for the Green Party:  For it speaks to 'our' issues; it puts us in a good position once again to show that we are the Party that has been ahead of the curve here (in terms of work-life balance, the well-being agenda, relocalising and so building community, etc), and that we are the Party to trust on this issue. It is good to see Labour starting finally to catch up with us a little bit on...

I debated Mike Hulme last night, as part of the UEA Public Lectures on 'Philosophy and the Environment'. It went well. But my fear is that some people like Mike's work so much, because it appears to offer them a reprieve. Mike's work suggests that it is somehow OK for us to disagree about manmade climate change. But the parameters within which it is OK are limited. If we go on disagreeing much longer, we'll be arguing underwater...

Clegg is the true face of liberalism, as Willetts was before him. It is high time that egalitarians admitted this, and ditched Rawls as their patron philosopher. Goodbye to the political philosophy of liberalism, which has acted as an apologia for the disaster triumphant of climate-chaos, financial metdown, rampant inequality, etc. . It is a new socialism (eco-socialism) that we need, not Rawls/Clegg. Check out the interesting ongoing discussion here, about this: http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/stuart-white/is-clegg-abandoning-liberalism   . And my earlier piece on a similar theme: http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/rupert-read/philosophical-and-political-implications-of-spirit-level-response-to-gerry-ha   -- Rupert Read Green Party Councillor, Norwich. http://rupertread.net [If you have an urgent email for me while I am away from a regular computer, you may wish to try contacting me instead on rupertread+mob AT gmail.com] WHY NOT FOLLOW M...

    The Countryside and Cultural Change   Conference, review and discussions Sainsbury Centre, Garden Restaurant Friday 3 rd December 2010                                                   Review of Culture of the Countryside, summary of its methods and findings:   5.30 – 6.30                           Keynote Lecture and discussion                                             ...

There will be a UEA Public Lecture on Philosophy and the Environment this Thursday, 25th November, at 7 pm in LT2. This is a debate between Mike Hulme and Rupert Read on environmental science and philosophy . All welcome.

  Nice to see the UN 'leading' on this one... Sheesh http://planetark.org/enviro-news/item/60199 "Preventing deaths and destruction from disasters pays, if done right," according to the 250-page report by 70 experts entitled "Natural Hazards, UnNatural Disasters." and "Losses will triple primarily because you have economic growth and ... more people and property located in richer areas. As people get richer they have more to lose," lead author Apurva Sanghi told a telephone news conference. WHAT A BUNCH OF ......   [Doesn't this rather support my general thinking -- see e.g. my recent post about 'ecosystem services' -- about the problem with putting everything into financial terms?]

"The Labour left's role is to establish connections, in periods of Labour opposition, with other 'progressives' - they always do it, and it invariably ends in recrimination and disappointment when the disciplines of Labourism are reasserted on return to power!" - An important, provocative remark from Andy Pearmain, Norwich-based Gramscian historian, formely a Labour Councillor, now with us (the Greens)...

http://rupertsread.blogspot.com/2010/11/change-we-need-to-escape-permanent.html http://rupertsread.blogspot.com/2010/10/economically-valuing-ecosystem-services.html http://rupertsread.blogspot.com/2010/10/stopping-slavery-and-stopping-climate.html http://rupertsread.blogspot.com/2010/10/utopias-changing-climate-conference.html http://greenwordsworkshop.org/node/18 http://oneworldcolumn.blogspot.com/2010/07/growth-and-death.html http://oneworldcolumn.blogspot.com/2010/06/our-responsibility-to-future-justice-or.html http://oneworldcolumn.blogspot.com/2010/03/future-people.html

If we are to avoid being in a permanent ecological crisis, breaching the limits to growth, there are two over-arching requirements that our political, economic, legal etc. systems must observe: 1) 1 1 1) They need to involve genuinely long-term thinking, long-term planning. (We need and feel to think the needs of the 7 th generation, and beyond.) 2) 2 2 2) They need also to be able to be rapidly-responsive to swiftly-changing environmental conditions, when those arise; e.g. to potential ‘climate surprises’, and in general to the need to change systems fast which are fuelling ecological threats that we have very limited time-spans to avert. As soon as one reflects honestly upon the nature of the systems that we do in fact have, one realises just how dire a situation we are in, and how dramatically we need to shift our energy in order to give ourselves a chance of bringing about the change that we need in order to escape the crises currently staring us in the face...

It's right that we should honour our war dead. But it is terribly important that such remembrance doesn't get confused with the cause for which they fought. Because sometimes (e.g. WW2) that cause is more honourable than others (e.g. Iraq, Afghanistan). The British soldiers who are now dying in Afghanistan are not in reality dying to preserve our peace and freedom. They are dying to save the government's (and the Americans') face, and to prop up a corrupt unelected puppet regime in Kabul. This is a terrible betrayal. Our government is lying to them about the cause for which they are fighting. It's important that we don't betray them by pretending that the cause for which they are fighting is democracy, peace and freedom.. It's important that we remember them and their fallen comrades, especially at this time of year. And it's equally important that we support our troops  in the best possible way we can: by undercutting lies about what t...

Come and see Cath Elliott, renowned Guardian blogger, speak to Norwich Greens, Tuesday night (tomorrow), 7pm, upstairs in the Marlborough Arms (Sewell, Norwich North), about feminism and blogging. Free!

This article will do the FibDems' reputation the world of good. This beats even the most extreme lying bargraph handsdown for chutzpah! http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/nov/07/scrap-tuition-fees-we-have This MP is going to seriously regret writing this. He is already being savaged in the comments, and on Twitter.

Check out my new '20 questions' profile piece, part of Paul Burgin's long-running series over at Mars Hill: http://paulburgin.blogspot.com/2010/11/twenty-questions-to-fellow-blogger-part.html [Do make comments over there rather than here.]

Let's be very clear. It was LABOUR who opened the floodgates to the university tuition fees debacle that is now being imposed on our country. The LibDems have allowed it to happen; the Tories made it happen; but it was Labour who commissioned the Browne report, and it was Labour who set the whole thing up in the first place, by imposing top-up fees. As soon as the argument had been made by Charles Clarke that it was right for students to pay a substantial amount toward their higher education, and that higher education free at the point of delivery was going to be a thing of the past, then full-scale marketization became inevitable. It was only a matter of time. I made this argument at the time, as did Ian Gibson. We have, sadly, been proven right by today's news that the ConDems are going to bring in variable fees of up to £9k. It is LABOUR who need to take the blame for having created the conditions for this dreadful outcome. (And it is only the Green Party (and ...

Happy to see two blogs that I write for in the two top slots here: http://politicalscrapbook.net/2010/11/political-scrapbook-in-top-10-blogs/?utm_campaign=twitter&utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitter

  The litterpick is to take place on Sunday 7th November from 2.30pm, in the heart of the North Earlham / Larkman estate: Green Party Councillors are organising a community litterpick in the Cadge Road area on Sunday 7th November at 2:30pm, meeting initially outside the Grove Pub. Lots of people have been concerned about the amount of litter in the area and the litterpick is a great way show how much people in the community care about the issue. We will be inviting local businesses and community organisations to come along and take part and we will provide all the equipment to ensure that residents who help out are safe and clean! If _you_ would like to come then email me (or comment here) so we have an idea of numbers - but do feel free in any case just to turn up on the day. We're doing this just to make a difference, but we're also doing it to put pressure on the owners of the Grove Pub site to tidy up the litter on site. They have been asked to do ...

 The one world column is dead? NO! Long live the OneWorldColumn! We are going on, by ourselves, post-EDP... http://oneworldcolumn.blogspot.com/2010/11/one-world-column-looking-back-looking.html

If you, dear Rupert's Reader, want to check out what I argue to be the in-principle limited predictability of human behaviour, based on 'reflexive' considerations, then you could do worse than to look at my 'There is no such thing as a social science'. But more directly relevant, in that it specifically discusses the environmental case (which my book does not) is the series of brilliant papers in this area by Larry Lohmann: for instance, http://www.thecornerhouse.org.uk/resource/whose-voice-speaking  , http://www.thecornerhouse.org.uk/resource/cost-benefit-analysis-dilemma http://www.thecornerhouse.org.uk/resource/carbon-trading-climate-justice-and-production-ignorance  , http://www.thecornerhouse.org.uk/resource/unregulatability-financial-and-carbon-markets  , http://www.thecornerhouse.org.uk/resource/when-markets-are-poison  , http://www.thecornerhouse.org.uk/resource/uncertainty-markets-and-carbon-markets http://www.thecornerhouse.org....

My evidence to Parliament’s Environmental Audit Committee on my idea for Guardians for future generations, with strong powers: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201011/cmselect/cmenvaud/writev/esd/esd12.htm

These two dramatic developments in recent days [see links below], especially that at Nagoya, seem to offer great hope. But are they really as good news as they appear? As argued in my paper in THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF GREEN ECONOMICS a couple of years ago ( http://www.rupertread.fastmail.co.uk/Economics_is_philosophy%20full%20length.doc  ), I am deeply concerned that the sudden move to accepting the financial valuation of ecosystem services (1) embraces a brand of anthropocentrism that in fact aims stand opposed to ecocentrism (because the financial numbers are all based on capitalist economics, which attributes no real value to nature, only to human wants), (2) delegitimises moves to value nature on other grounds (once we have a number attached to nature, won't people who say that it is priceless be told not just that they are merely sentimentalising, but that they are factually mistaken?), (3) is incoherent and so vulnerable to attack (because nature - and ourse...

Do read this, if you are interested in understanding how even Scotland would benefit from the clocks not going back tonight: http://www.psi.org.uk/pdf/2010/SCOTLAND_DAYLIGHT_FINAL_v4.pdf

This very thoughtful post http://bit.ly/cHTPZu  carefully makes the argument that those opposing serious action on dangerous climate-change eerily echo the arguments of those who opposed serious action to stop slavery. It points out for example the striking parallels that exist between the arguments of the capitalists who called for only voluntary action to reduce the negative impact of slavery, and the arguments of the capitalists who call now for only voluntary action to reduce the negative impact of manmade climate change.     But the parallels can be taken one stage further:     Global over-heating is happening because of our burning of ever more fossil fuels. This burning gives us access to a vast energy glut, compared to which almost all the preceding existence of human beings has been extraordinarily low energy. But Peak Oil and the soon-to-follow Peak Gas mean that this glut will be temporary. In future, people will not have acce...

This is very important good news. Geoengineering puts our ecosystems at dire risk (and distracts from actually fixing the climate - which is why Newt Gingrich loves it). ...Major victory for common sense as hacking of planetary ecosystems is premature until such time as all other options are exhausted; and until there are global protocols, consensus and a sound scientific basis for any geoengineering that may or may not occur. October 29, 2010 From Earth's Newsdesk and Climate Ark, projects of Ecological Internet (EI) http://www.ecoearth.info/newsdesk/ | http://www.climateark.org/ NAGOYA, Japan - Ecological Internet welcomes reports that the 193-member UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) will close its tenth biennial meeting with a de facto moratorium on geoengineering projects and experiments. This is a tremendous victory for the ETC Group's "Hands Off Mother Earth" campaign [1], which has carefully researched and presented the case for such a ...

Following the Government's announcement yesterday that there is as yet no funding for a Northern Distributor Road, Green Party councillors havecalled for the Greater Norwich Development Partnership (GNDP) to withdraw the Joint Core Strategy (JCS).       Councillor Phil Hardy said 'This announcement makes it clear that there is no funding for an NDR before a further review in December 2011.   This removes any case that the JCS plan can be implemented based around the NDR.   This news simply makes the JCS plan unsound and it should now be withdrawn immediately.   This would be good news for many people who oppose the housing allocations and the high carbon transport strategy.   Now is the time for the GNDP to go back to the drawing board and develop a Plan B that is low carbon, public transport led with more realistic housing allocations.     Green Party councillors are also calling for the NDR to be abandoned...

  http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/oct/26/barnet-no-frills-council-overspends This serves as a warning to the Tories (and ConDems) that if we cut too quickly we'll end up spending more .  

http://www.shapingnorfolksfuture.org.uk/content/rail/ : I'm broadly supportive of this campaign, though not particularly of the 'Norwich in 90' component thereof! FAR more important than time-reductions on the timetable is improving the reliability of train services, and working to reduce or eliminate the weekend repair schedule which devastate weekend rail travel in our Region. Surveys show this again and again: people don't mind much about 10 minutes on a timetable; what they mind about is hours of uncertainty or delay in real life.   As for the changes that the government are proposing to make to rail franchises: It is all very well to extend the franchise to 12 or 15 years, but what would be better would be to extend the franchise to permanency - while taking it back 'in house'! I.e. Renationalise the railways. That is the only cure to a balkanized rail system which has resulted in obscenely vast private profits at public expense without a...

Have a listen to my talk on 'Love or justice?' at a recent Conference in Australia, that I joined by audiolink (very very early in the morning, while still in my pajamas).   You have to listen closely, but its worth it! ;-) http://arts.monash.edu.au/ecps/assets/podcasts/2010-09-01t1432-read-care-love-and-our-responsibility-to-the-future-utopias-conference.mp3

http://modernhiddenhistory.blogspot.com/2010/10/racism-religion-and-american-and-uk_26.html  An important piece here on the vast crime of depleted uranium use by the UK/US forces in Iraq. I questioned Charles Clarke (then my MP) about this in the run-up to the criminal attack on Iraq in 2003. To my pleasant surprise, he insisted in reply that d.u. would not be used anywhere at all where it could harm civilians, in Iraq, and suggested to me that it was unlikely to be used at all by the British Armed Forces. To my unpleasant surprise since, these claims turned out to be entirely false. Roddy's article rightly speaks of Britain's involvement in nothing less than nuclear war in the Mid-East. Our government committed what is (according to the Nuremberg tribunal) the supreme international crime, a war of aggression, in 2003, on the basis of the lie that Iraq had WMDs. But Britain and the U.S. did have WMDs, nuclear weapons - and they used them. Depleted uranium - i.e. ...

I am giving a little talk (and a ‘practical’) as part of the upcoming UEA Wellbeing Week, under its ‘Mental Health & Philosophy’ rubric. The event will be at the Dean of Students' Office Meeting Room (on campus) running from 10am-11am on Monday 15 th November. The title of the event is: 'Meditation as an aid to mental health: A practical primer and some philosophical reflections'.

A FAIRER GREENER SOCIETY: NOT SAVAGE CUTS     We are about to witness the biggest spending review that this country has seen for a generation, with all of us being told to tighten our belts. No stone seems to be left unturned, as the coalition government seeks to balance the books that the bankers' irresponsibility has unbalanced: today the Armed forces and the BBC ( http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/oct/20/spending-review-cuts-bbc ), tomorrow the rest of us: everyone is braced for the next round of cuts. The greatest long-term threat to the country, and to our planet, is environmental destruction, including of course manmade climate change, but this has been consistently ignored. The government is actually cutting its ecological spending, giving the lie to its one-time (and now utterly laughable) claim of aiming to be the greenest government ever: ( http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/oct/18/green-campaigners-comprehensive-spending-review ) ...

  A campaign has just been launched to encourage more East of England people to consider becoming a local councillor. Quite right too!  Check it out:  Website :   http://beacouncillor.eelga.gov.uk/ Blog :   http://beacllreast.wordpress.com Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Be-a-Councillor-East/162224970460003 Twitter:   https://twitter.com/BeACllrEast   We in the Green Party are contributing by holding an event on Nov. 6 for anyone interested in becoming a Green Councillor here in the East. If you would like to take part, please get in touch with me ‘offblog’.  

It is important at every opportunity to speak of 'ecology' and 'ecosystems' rather than 'the environment'. The latter is too easily assimilable to neoclassical economics, to 'us vs them' thinking about nature, etc. . The future is ecosystems and their restoration (or bust). -- Rupert Read Green Party Councillor, Norwich. http://rupertread.net [If you have an urgent email for me while I am away from a regular computer, you may wish to try contacting me instead on rupertread+mob AT gmail.com ] WHY NOT FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER?: twitter.com/GreenRupertRead

What is crucial in this [below] is the link between economy and ecosystem. This is where the GP's position is distinctive: Our Party believes in one planet living! Other Parties presumably think that in a moment or two we'll be off mining in space etc - pure fantasy... __________________________________________________________________ WWF has launched the 2010 edition of the Living Planet Report http://nl.panda.org/inxmail?i4710vmfk0e0bdiubqbwqx3a528 . The report is published every 2 years and is considered to be the world's leading, science-based analysis about the impact of human activity on the health of our planet. This is a big deal for us and we wanted to share it with you, our supporter, straight away. It's key finding: humanity's demands exceed our planet's capacity to sustain us. That is, we ask for more than what we have. Why does this happen? How can we change this and guarantee a healthy future for human kind? You'll find some answers below: == L...

Quite right, for the 100th object in R4's series to be a solar light and charger (with, as I understand it, a mobile phone also that can be charged up from the solar charger?). Solar is the future. If we are to have a future: solar is absolutely key. So this takes us from history to the future. Good decision...

 Nice to have some good news, for a change!:   Scientists Call for Axe to Fall on Nuclear Weapons Research Press Release: Wednesday 13 October 2010. 36 science professors have today written to the Prime Minister calling on him to protect core scientific research by cutting investment in developing new nuclear weapons. The scientists, who include ex-Royal Society head, Sir Michael Atiyah and Nobel Prize winner, Sir Harold Kroto, highlight how £2bn a year, over 25% of the government's total scientific research and development budget, is currently spent by the Ministry of Defence (1). Their objections focus on government funding of a multi-billion pound research programme at the Atomic Weapons Establishment at Aldermaston, aimed at developing new nuclear warheads. This year this science programme received an additional £1bn of government funding, and this level of 'additional investment' is set to continue until 2013 (2). These funds have ena...