My week in Westminster: Part 2

Wednesday 4 December 2013

Alan Pitt

After two days of being in the ‘classroom’ learning about science in Parliament and Government it was time to go and shadow my civil servant, Alan Pitt, the Secretary to the Council for Science and Technology (S&T) who advise the Prime Minister directly on science related issues. Alan is based in the Government Office for Science (Go-Science), which is located in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills! My morning began by visiting Portcullis House to hear the Government Chief Scientific Advisor, Sir Mark Walport, be quizzed by the House of Commons S&T Select Committee, which consists of cross-party MPs. Their job is to scrutinise Government on S&T to ensure the policy making process is robust. Mark Walport, gave an overview of his vision for Science in the UK which included infrastructure in terms of energy and climate, qualitative and quantitative scientific evidence used in Government and a prominent leadership role for science. This session was followed by an inquiry on Horizon Scanning including what this entails and how it operates!

Sir Mark Walport

Next stop was BIS where I was introduced to various members of Go-Science who explained their roles as civil servants including defence and resilience, coordinating all the different scientific committees, groups etc. I learnt about the complexity of science organisation in the civil service. For example, every department bar one has a Chief Scientific Advisor and a team beneath them. They report to Ministers who report to the Prime Minister.

Alan was particularly busy organising the CST quarterly meeting to be held at the Royal Society! Mid-afternoon I went with him over to the Royal Society building to help set up for the evening meeting and dinner. The CST consists of members appointed by the Prime Minister who have extremely impressive credentials. Chaired by the Government Chief Scientific Advisor, other members include Vice Chancellors, the President of the Royal Society, and prominent scientists in business.

After a busy but thoroughly enjoyable day it was time to go and see a show in the West-End!

Thursday 5 December 2013
On my final day of shadowing I was lucky enough to be able to sit on the CST meeting and hear what they get to discuss and consequently some of the content that goes into a letter directly written for the Prime Minister! It was a fascinating if little surreal experience! I finished my time in London by having a tour of the Royal Society with the opportunity to see the original scribblings of Isaac Newton and Robert Hooke.

The Royal Society Pairing scheme has been an action-packed and fun experience and a real eye-opener to how science is used in Parliament and Government. Everything is far more scrutinised then I ever envisaged and I hope that the scheme will help to enhance this process by building relationships between the policy makers and the scientists.
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This blog has been written by Dr Emma J Stone, Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol.
Emma is visiting civil servant Alan Pitt, secretary to the Prime Minister's Council for Science and Technology, at the House of Commons for a ‘Week in Westminster’ commencing Monday 2 December as part of a unique pairing scheme run by the Royal Society. Read more.

Dr Emma J Stone

Converting probabilities between time-intervals

This is the first in an irregular sequence of snippets about some of the slightly more technical aspects of uncertainty and risk assessment. If you have a slightly more technical question, then please email me and I will try to answer it with a snippet. Suppose that an event has a probability of 0.015 (or 1.5%) of happening at least once in the next five years. Then the probability of the event happening at least once in the next year is 0.015 / 5 = 0.003 (or 0.3%), and the probability of it happening at least once in the next 20 years is 0.015 * 4 = 0.06 (or 6%). Here is the rule for scaling probabilities to different time intervals: if both probabilities (the original one and the new one) are no larger than 0.1 (or 10%), then simply multiply the original probability by the ratio of the new time-interval to the original time-interval, to find the new probability. This rule is an approximation which breaks down if either of the probabilities is greater than 0.1. For example

1-in-200 year events

You often read or hear references to the ‘1-in-200 year event’, or ‘200-year event’, or ‘event with a return period of 200 years’. Other popular horizons are 1-in-30 years and 1-in-10,000 years. This term applies to hazards which can occur over a range of magnitudes, like volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, tsunamis, space weather, and various hydro-meteorological hazards like floods, storms, hot or cold spells, and droughts. ‘1-in-200 years’ refers to a particular magnitude. In floods this might be represented as a contour on a map, showing an area that is inundated. If this contour is labelled as ‘1-in-200 years’ this means that the current rate of floods at least as large as this is 1/200 /yr, or 0.005 /yr. So if your house is inside the contour, there is currently a 0.005 (0.5%) chance of being flooded in the next year, and a 0.025 (2.5%) chance of being flooded in the next five years. The general definition is this: ‘1-in-200 year magnitude is x’ = ‘the current rate for eve

Coconuts and climate change

Before pursuing an MSc in Climate Change Science and Policy at the University of Bristol, I completed my undergraduate studies in Environmental Science at the University of Colombo, Sri Lanka. During my final year I carried out a research project that explored the impact of extreme weather events on coconut productivity across the three climatic zones of Sri Lanka. A few months ago, I managed to get a paper published and I thought it would be a good idea to share my findings on this platform. Climate change and crop productivity There has been a growing concern about the impact of extreme weather events on crop production across the globe, Sri Lanka being no exception. Coconut is becoming a rare commodity in the country, due to several reasons including the changing climate. The price hike in coconuts over the last few years is a good indication of how climate change is affecting coconut productivity across the country. Most coconut trees are no longer bearing fruits and thos

Cabot Institute for the Environment blog

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