Chi leads MP probe into regional growth
In the coming months a major new report on regional innovation and growth will outline how science and technology could transform the economy in every corner of the UK. It will also detail the barriers to achieving that, and how they can be overcome.
The report, still tightly under wraps, will come from the Parliamentary Select Committee on Science, Innovation and Technology.
It is the result of nine months work – oral evidence sessions, research, site visits – by the 11 cross-bench committee members, led by their Chair, Dame Chi Onwurah, a Newcastle MP for 15 years and Labour’s Shadow Science Minister for four years before the 2024 election.
The Select Committee system has been described as the “jewel in Westminster’s crown”. Internationally unique and non-partisan, these committees have a well-deserved reputation for their ability to hold the government to account.
They scrutinize policy, conduct rigorous inquiries resulting in detailed published reports that receive government responses, and engage with experts and stakeholders to influence policy development and ensure decisions are based on scientific principles. As a result they also wield considerable influence.
Chi Onwurah added: “It is the role of the Select Committee to scrutinise the work of the department, but also our role is to look at the scientific and technological basis for all government decisions across all departments.”
One of the Committee’s most high-profile inquiries was launched in the wake of the riots that followed the horrific attack in Southport in 2024, when 17-year-old Axel Rudakubana killed three children and injured 10 others in a mass stabbing at a dance studio.
The Committee’s report on Social Media, Misinformation and Harmful Algorithms, published in July pulled no punches.
Among its conclusions and recommendations it said: “The evidence supports the conclusion that social media business models incentivise the spread of content that is damaging and dangerous, and did so in a manner that endangered public safety in the hours and days following the Southport murders.
“Social media companies have often argued that they are not publishers but platforms, abdicating responsibility for the content they put online. We believe that these services, with sophisticated recommendation algorithms that directly amplify and push content to users, are not merely platforms but curators of content.”
In August Chi Onwurah – created a Dame in the King’s Birthday Honours List in July for her political and public service – hit the headlines again when ministers had to publish an information security review triggered by the 2023 leak of personal data of about 10,000 serving officers in the Police Service of Northern Ireland.
The existence of this review had not previously been public knowledge but was published in response to requests from Chi Onwurah, as Select Committee Chair, for clarity about the government's work to prevent a repeat of the 2022 MOD Afghan data breach.
When it was finally released it was revealed the review by Cabinet Office officials had expanded to take in 11 public sector data breaches, encompassing the HMRC, the Metropolitan police, the benefits system and the Ministry of Defence.
Driving innovation and science
But it is the Committee’s work on the Regional Innovation and Growth report that has dominated much of Chi’s time since she launched it in December last year – almost her first act as Committee Chair.
“The very first visit we organised as a committee was to Liverpool Science Park and the Innovation Park because we recognise the importance of science parks and business parks in bringing together innovators and giving them the opportunity to exchange ideas and have access to skills and capital.”
Chi continued: “I grew up in Newcastle in the 1970s and the 1980s. I was there for the deindustrialization of a great industrial region and that's part of the reason why I was inspired to study engineering. I had seen the value of engineering, from Stephenson’s railways to Parsons – inventors of the modern steam turbine – to the huge Armstrong Works.
“But it was also a source of good jobs for my friends’ parents. So I witnessed the deindustrialisation, the poverty and also the lack of pride that resulted from it. People want jobs they can be proud of, which is what science and engineering can deliver.
“Witnessing the impact on communities across the North East marked my ambitions when I came into politics, particularly given how much I had benefited from a career in engineering.”
She continued: “I now work as part of an absolutely fantastic committee from right across the political spectrum: Labour, Tories, Lib Dems. And almost all of them have a scientific or engineering background or interest – we’ve got three PhDs.
“We’re from constituencies across the country so we all really want to support this Government’s ambitions in terms of driving innovation and science, creating engines of growth across the country.
“We wanted to see how we could ensure that could happen, how we could actually deliver in terms of the scientific and innovation ecosystems in the different regions across our country. A one-size-fits-all approach is not going to work, which is why the Regional Innovation and Growth Inquiry was one of the first that we agreed to set up.
“It has been fascinating, if not always encouraging.”
The report will assess the role of the UK’s innovation ecosystem in achieving the Government’s mission to kickstart economic growth across the country.
“We’ve taken all the evidence since December last year. Now we are digesting and writing the report up. It’s showing the huge opportunity that exists.”
In an Op-Ed article in the Financial Times this summer Chi made a strong argument for the need to ensure that the benefits of UK science and innovation are spread nationwide, rather than concentrated in the Golden Triangle around Cambridge, London and Oxford.
She wrote: “Today, investment has to mean science and technology. In our enquiry into regional innovation and growth, the select committee has taken wide-ranging evidence. From the education and skilling of the workforce, to technology and capital deployment in businesses, start ups and spin outs, to lab facilities and ‘catapult’ tech centres, to internet and transport connectivity, disparities need to be addressed. That means building on the existing business and technology strengths of the diverse regions, working with regional governments and, in particular, mayors.
“To escape economic stagnation we must take up this agenda. And it must begin with the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology — but not end there. Lifting productivity must be a co-ordinated project across government.” Reinventing ourselves
As well as travelling the length and breadth of the country, there has been a series of hearings as the Committee took evidence for the report.
Chi said: “One of the innovations I brought to the Select Committee was that for the first 15 minutes of every session we showcased an innovator chosen by one of the members. And that really highlighted to us all the sorts of innovation and research that is happening across the country.
“In my home city of Newcastle, but also in Liverpool and Manchester, we have reinvented ourselves. In the North East now we have huge strengths in life sciences, in business processes and in video games as well. And there’s great work going on in all our different regions.
“The challenge is to enable that research, that science and innovation, and also encourage the sort of mindset that wants to change the world for the better. And we need to tie that up with the right finance, the right skills etc, so we can leverage that potential into real economic growth, great jobs and prosperity across our whole country.
“Taking evidence, we've spoken to academics, we've spoken to industry professionals, talked to local government both at mayoral and local authority levels about how innovation can drive economic growth in the regions.
“And we’ve examined the cliches, including one I hate: that we’re very good at research but very bad at commercialisation.
“We really looked at the evidence behind these cliches, examining the underlying causes. Why don’t we have access to capital in the regions? What is the link between applied research, pure research, commercialisation and technology diffusion?
“I think we have succeeded in identifying in a number of different ways in which we can connect that fantastic scientific and technological potential to economic growth opportunities.
“At the same time it's also important to emphasise that we can't be doing everything everywhere. One of our committee members, George Freeman, was the Minister for Science under the previous Conservative government and he’s really leading the charge on clustering – bringing together scientific and technological strengths in clusters so you get the critical mass to drive investment, drive skills and drive an ecosystem engine.
“There will be a lot of detail, but I think we’ve been able to put it in a framework focused on regional economic growth, with science and innovation as drivers of that.
“It will also need to address the impact of the distance from Whitehall and the implications that has in different areas, in terms of access to capital and access to infrastructure. Historically there is a real lack public infrastructure in the regions. Where investment in Greater London was £34 per head, in my North East Combined Authority it’s £4.77 per head.
“But we are looking at private investment in infrastructure too. We have had some great evidence from science parks and business parks about how to address that.
“We need to address the disparity between London and South East and the rest of the country. It’s a situation that is self-reinforcing: you effectively have two countries getting further apart because decisions on where to invest are based on the source of pure return. So you invest where there is already big investment and you get more infrastructure where it will deliver a greater return.
“At the same time we recognise that you can’t build something from nothing; you can’t just have a centre for excellence in, say, new technology somewhere where there’s no background for it. We have to build on what is already there, region by region. But there are themes that the committee has been looking at, which can be applied to build on local strengths. And we’ve also been looking at what is happening on the ground and the barriers to achieving that regional innovation and growth that we want to see.”
Success over prejudice
Chi Onwurah was born in Wallsend and grew up in Newcastle, steeped in the industrial traditions of her North East home.
Her maternal grandfather was a sheet metal worker in the shipyards on the Tyne during the Depression. Her mother grew up in poverty in Garth Heads on the quayside, before marrying Chi’s father, a Nigerian student at Newcastle Medical School.
Chi, who joined the Labour Party at 16, went on to study electrical engineering at Imperial College London. In a minority of one – a working class woman of colour and an engineering student – she had to battle every kind of prejudice. But she built a successful career in telecommunications.
She was part of the team that set up the first mobile telephone network in Nigeria. “That's one of things I'm proudest of. I had spent time in Nigeria before and I was able to see first-hand how technology could be absolutely transformative. At that point just 1% of Nigerians had access to telephony and within two years of our launching the mobile network that had risen to 10%.
“I was part of building this network, providing technology which changes so many people’s lives for the better. It was really inspiring.
“My father was living in Nigeria and I was able to hand him the first mobile phone in his town before the network launched. I told him: ‘This doesn’t work now but in six weeks time you will be able to call me on this phone.’ That was very moving, both for me and for him.
“Like many Nigerian parents of the time, he thought medicine, law or perhaps accountancy were the only professions worth talking about. So he was very disappointed when I chose to study engineering, but when I gave him that phone he said perhaps this engineering malarky was worthwhile after all.”
Reach out to Dame Chi Onwurah MP To contact Dame Chi Onwurah MP and her team, visit her official Government MP profile or see her website at chionwurahmp.com