UK draws up plans for £6bn science programme if EU blocks entry to Horizon
The UK will spend £6bn over the next three years on a new science fund if the EU continues to shut out Britain from the Horizon Europe research programme.
Brussels agreed to let the UK join the seven-year €95bn (£80.4bn) Horizon programme post-Brexit, however its entry has been blocked in the wake of a row over Northern Ireland.
The fund was set up this year by the EU, with eligible businesses, researchers and institutions able to apply for grants.
Science minister George Freeman told the Financial Times today that he was now drawing up plans to create a UK-only fund, while adding that the government’s preference is still to enter Horizon.
Freeman said “perhaps after the French elections and the resolution of various issues still being discussed around Brexit, association will be possible”.
He refused to say how long the UK would wait until launching its own programme.
He said any British fund would be a “coherent and ambitious plan for international science . . . based on the elements of Horizon that researchers find most valuable – global fellowships, strong industrial challenge funding, innovation missions around tomorrow’s technologies. Outside Horizon we have the freedom to be more global”.
The Brexit Withdrawal Agreement stated that the UK would be able to join the programme, however the EU’s research commissioner Mariya Gabriel says this will be blocked until there is an agreement on how to implement the Northern Ireland Protocol.
This has left British businesses, researchers and universities unable to apply for grants.
Hundreds of EU science research bodies wrote to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen this week to call for the UK to gain entry to Horizon.