Abstract
WHILE the veil of secrecy drawn for the most part over the activities of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research since the spring of 1939 remains unlifted, and we still await the resumption of publication of the annual reports of the Department and even the appearance of the long-promised review of its war-time activities, pronouncements regarding administrative developments are made in diverse ways and sometimes to strange audiences. The address of the Lord President of the Council to the North Herts Labour Party at Letch-worth on January 14, containing the important announcement regarding the development of a scientific centre at the new town of Stevenage, is a recent example. Mr. Morrison prefaced his announcement by stating that the Government is eager to see science supporting enterprise in the national effort for economic recovery and independence. It proposes to bring to public enterprise new ideas and progressive development by making full use of the unrivalled scientific brains of Britain, sweeping away the old isolation of science and the tendency to look at scientific workers as people not needed in industry or only needed in the ‘back ‘room, or as long-haired old gentlemen cut off from worldly affairs. The Government is taking steps, he said, to bring science into the forefront of British industry, and does not believe that industry can give the nation what it wants in increasing abundance at decreasing costs unless science becomes more of a partner.
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Government Research in Britain. Nature 161, 214–215 (1948). https://doi.org/10.1038/161214a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/161214a0