Britain’s new Europe minister is urging Brussels to put politics aside and speed up the funding for academic research in science which has been held up since the dispute over the Northern Ireland Protocol.
Europe Minister Leo Docherty is due to make a speech to British and European parliamentarians on Nov. 7 in which he will accuse the EU of failing to fulfil its side of the post-Brexit trade agreement by refusing access to the £80 billion ($91 billion) Horizon programme.
Docherty, who was only appointed on Oct. 27 after Rishi Sunak took over as prime minister, will say: “The UK’s participation would be a clear win-win for the UK and the EU, but the UK cannot wait much longer. The EU’s approach is causing intolerable uncertainty for our research and business communities.”
Docherty, a former British Army soldier who served in Germany and Afghanistan, will call for more cooperation between British and European universities in a variety of scientific fields, from climate change to health and energy.
In August, Stepan Stepanenko, a research fellow at the Henry Jackson Society told The Epoch Times the UK government had “shot themselves in the foot” by rejecting the Northern Ireland Protocol, antagonising the EU and jeopardising Britain’s role in Horizon.
The protocol was negotiated by former Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government as part of the Brexit negotiations but it later became unpopular within the unionist and loyalist community because it effectively placed a border in the Irish Sea, while allowing customs-free trade on the island of Ireland.
UK and EU are ‘Effective Allies’
Universities and other scientific researchers began to notice increasing bureaucratic delays in funding of science programmes under the Horizon programme.The government has been distracted by a summer of political chaos with Johnson resigning in July, then Truss coming in and pushing a mini-budget which was greeted badly by the financial markets, leading her to do a complete U-turn and then resign.
Now Sunak’s government is trying to pick up the pieces and it clearly hopes Docherty’s speech will be heard in Brussels.
Docherty, who represents the Aldershot constituency which is home to the British Army, is set to identify the Ukraine conflict as a symbol of the power Britain and Europe can have when they work together.
He will say, “A clear lesson from the last nine months has been that despite the challenges in our relationship, the UK and EU are effective allies where it matters most.”
“The Ukrainians have stood firm against Vladimir Putin, in part because of the actions of our Government and those across the EU. That action has been stronger because it has been coordinated between us,” Docherty will add.
