Why should scientific powerhouse Brexit Britain subsidise the EU’s scientists?

For years the EU Commission broke its TCA agreement with the UK over Horizon Europe

Montage © Facts4EU.Org 2024

Facts4EU.Org exposes how the ‘rule of law’ EU broke its international treaty with the UK

For years the EU continued to deny Brexit Britain’s scientists access to its bloated scientific research programme called ‘Horizon Europe’. Negotiations foundered again and again, mostly based on the amount the EU wanted the UK to pay, and the UK was effectively blackmailed over the problems with the N.I. Protocol.

Just as with the EU’s disastrous and vastly expensive ‘Erasmus+’ student exchange programme, as an EU member the UK had to pay billions into the EU’s Horizon Europe.

Under the ‘Trade and Co-operation Agreement’ (TCA), the UK Government agreed to continue to be part of Horizon Europe – against all our campaigning not to do so. Since the TCA was signed, however, the EU Commission refused to implement this. Bizarrely they tied access to Horizon Europe to the dispute over the Northern Ireland Protocol – an entirely separate matter.

Early last year, after signing the equally egregious ‘Windsor Framework’ to resolve the Northern Ireland dispute, Rishi Sunak was confident that access to Horizon Europe would be restored. This simply didn't happen - until now.

For three years the UK’s scientific community was blocked by the EU from participating in its four major science programmes. This participation was agreed under the UK-EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) but UK scientists continued to be barred by the EU, for its own political reasons.

Facts4EU.Org conducted its own research project into the EU and its refusal to comply with the terms of the TCA in respect of Britain’s scientists. Our conclusion was that it was time to consign the EU’s ‘Horizon Europe’ and Copernicus science projects to the petri-dish of history.

What are these EU science projects and how much will they be costing the UK taxpayer?

The EU has various scientific research programmes. The main ones are Horizon, Copernicus, Euratom Research & Training, and Fusion for Energy. In short, these broadly cover scientific and medical research, space and satellites, and nuclear.

For convenience we are going to refer to all of these as ‘Horizon Europe’ (the major one). The figures below show how much the UK Government allocated to these in its official 2021 Spending Review.

UK scientists complained – but so did the EU’s, and Brexit should not have been an issue

In essence, ‘Horizon Europe’ is all about funding research and cooperation between the scientists in European countries. Horizon already encompasses many countries outside the EU, so Brexit should never have been an issue.

Given the reputation of the UK’s scientific community there were as many scientists protesting in the EU about the UK’s exclusion as there were in the UK.

What did the UK Government do?

On 20 July 2022 the UK Government issued a statement.

The UK’s long-term Horizon Europe alternative - 'Pioneer'

With an R&D budget of £39.8 billion over the spending review period, the Dept for Business and Trade and other departments, with their partner organisations, were going to invest across a range of priority areas spanning fundamental research, talent, innovation and infrastructure.

In Part III of this report we will look at the UK's exciting new alternative to Horizon, which was called 'Pioneer'. Sadly the UK government's alignment to the EU's Horizon now makes this obsolete.

[ Sources: UK Dept for Business and Trade | DEFRA | 2021 Spending Review | EU Commission ] Politicians and journalists can contact us for details, as ever.

Brexit Facts4EU.Org, Sun 18 Feb 2024

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