Å®ÉúСÊÓƵ

AN ALLIANCE between Lord Hailsham and the civil service blocked the
Prime Minister’s plans to set up a Ministry of Science and Technology in
1959. This is revealed in documents disclosed this week under the rule which
allows Cabinet papers to be made public after 30 years.

Lord Hailsham, who was then Lord President, was later given the title
of Minister of Science, but without a department.

Harold Macmillan’s plan was to merge the Ministry of Supply and the
Department of Industrial and Scientific Research. He was backed by the Minister
of Supply, Aubrey Jones.

The image of British science had been badly dented by the Soviet Union’s
lead in space, following the launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957. An internal report
by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research attributed the Soviet
Union’s lead in space partly to its centralised control of science under
the Academy of Sciences.

Sir Norman Brook, the Cabinet secretary, led the civil service opposition
to the change. In minutes dated 17 March 1959, Brook said that following
talks with Macmillan he had included the proposal in notes for the discussion
of future policy. But he seemed to want to let the whole idea quietly disappear:
‘In these circumstances I do not think that there is any need for me to
make any formal written submission about this to the Prime Minister at this
²õ³Ù²¹²µ±ð.’

Meanwhile Hailsham, who as Lord President was already responsible for
the five research councils, told Macmillan: ‘There is ground for thinking
that the government apparatus for dealing with scientific matters is inadequate
. . .’

Hailsham added that if, as he expected, Brook’s study of setting up
a Ministry of Science proved to be impracticable he would make other proposals.

By May, with a general election looming, Macmillan asked Brook: ‘What
has happened about the Ministry of Science? I know the Lord President doesn’t
want it but I want it very much. How are you getting on?’

Nearly two months later, on 25 June, Brook rejected the proposals as
‘impractical’, arguing that defence research would dominate civil interests
in such a ministry, that legislation could be needed, and that scientists
opposed the creation of a ministry. Instead, Brook proposed creating a Minister
for Science.

While the government dithered, the Labour Party proposed in its election
manifesto to create a Ministry of Science, which would give grants and contracts
to private industry to finance civilian research.

Jones, the supply minister, was keen that the Conservatives should match
this pledge. But, as one civil servant drily observed, there was ‘the general
political disadvantage of trying to catch up with a promise that has already
been made by the Labour Party’.

After the Conservative victory in the general election of 1959, Macmillan
made Lord Hailsham Minister for Science and Technology. New Å®ÉúСÊÓƵ (22
October 1959) remarked that the minister ‘will work more by influence and
executive control . . . To a considerable extent the post is a public relations
Âá´Ç²ú.’