By MARK HENDERSON - TIMESONLINE
Added: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 23:00:00 UTC

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In the 1960s, Harold Wilson famously made an electoral slogan of "the white heat of technology" It is hard to imagine similar rhetoric from Gordon Brown or David Cameron today. When Britain goes to the polls a few weeks from now, it is safe to predict that science will not play much part in the outcome. It is unlikely even to be much discussed during the campaign. For all its importance to healthcare and economic growth, science is not thought to rouse voters' passion in the way of taxes or the NHS. To most politicians it is something to be managed between elections, not an issue for the hustings.
This low political profile leads to a democratic deficit. Because governments and MPs can be elected without significant scrutiny of their plans for science, they often feel that they can act without heeding the views of those who care about it.
Last year, Alan Johnson, the Home Secretary; thought that there were more votes in sounding tough on drugs than in backing the independence of his expert adviser, Professor David Nutt And with the national debt at £178 billion and rising, the science budget has become a prime candidate for cuts: it is seen as less sensitive than schools, pensions or hospitals.
It doesn't have to be this way. While science is never likely to be an issue with mass appeal, the constituency that takes an interest is larger than you might think. The Campaign for Science and Engineering estimates that there are more than three million people in Britain with a scientific background, ie, a relevant degree or a job in a research-intensive industry such as pharmaceuticals or IT. That amounts to about 7 per cent of the electorate - or about as many voters as in all the ethnic minorities put together.
These people, of course, are never likely to vote as a bloc but if enough of them were to make a priority of science, it would emerge as an issue no party could ignore.
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TAGGED: POLITICS, SCIENCE