Kevin Brennan – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kevin Brennan on 2016-03-17.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what recent assessment has he made of the potential impact on innovation in the UK of his Department’s change to government research and development funding from a grant-based to a loan-based system.

Joseph Johnson

Like many of our competitor economies, we are looking to provide a wider range of financial products to support, innovation in UK industry. In the coming months, we will, be conducting market research to better understand the needs of innovative businesses in the UK.

This will be followed by a pilot to test specific financial support mechanisms, with an evaluation in late 2016, leading to a roll-out of a range of new products in 2017. We will continue to provide grant funding to support research and development where appropriate – including, for example, aerospace research supported by the Aerospace Technology Institute and automotive research supported by the Advanced Propulsion Centre.