Belatedly politicians here UK ~ most of whom can't change a light-bulb without the manual ~ have noticed UK-funded university researchers take the first chance they can to develop their ideas in the US. And who could blame them?
The government had a body it funded in the shape of the British Technology Group (or BTG) that underwrote such research besides funding ideas from the likes of me, albeit without the same sort of success as monoclonal antibodies or MRI technology.
In fact I met Margaret Thatcher's minister for technology off the back of it and may he rest in peace*. It did not stop her ~ or her devil's spawn in the shape of Tony Blair ~ from shutting it down.
Its piss-poor substitute was NESTA, which describes itself as a UK charity devoted to sustainable living, fairer starts and healthier lives viz. bollocks. It was funded at the outset by vice in the form of gambling revenue drawn from the National Lottery; whereas now despite advertising as a charity, it still draws upon government grants from the likes of us.
We R.I.P'd Graham Barker on these pages recently, and so we'll leave the last word to him regarding, shall we?
Funny how we live on in our digital traces, though...
* Ed. Although it sounds like he was killed in a drive-by shooting by the author, we should point out it was 'Big-Tech Tony' who fired the fatal shot.
