Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 2:56 pm on 28 February 2023.
On your final point, part of our challenge is that the three areas you mention have had new ideas, they've had a conference of lots of people, and capital has then gone into lots of those new ideas and it's been kept there. Part of our challenge in the way innovation funding works in the UK is that Oxbridge is one of the areas in the golden triangle, with some London institutions, where it continues to crowd in more funding and investment. Our challenge is not just to say, 'We want to stop money going there.' Actually, we're going to need to see more money going to other parts of the UK as well, rather than a reductive competition that simply takes money out of what is already successful. And that's difficult for us, actually, but it's the mission that the UK Government have set when they've increased, I think by over £20 billion, the innovation money they're prepared to spend. That's a good thing. You don't often hear me say good things about the UK Government, but it's a good thing they've been prepared to do that. They've then got to make sure it isn't just about geographic equity in where it's invested in the rest of the UK, but that they recognise the areas of very real strength and opportunity that exist in other parts of the UK, and it's also the consistency of acting in those three areas you've mentioned as well that have been consistent.
I know very well the Member's warning about Nokia. I used to have a Nokia phone, as indeed did all of my friends at one point in time, but none of us do now.
On patents, it's one of the things we want to work on with a range of people to make sure they have got patents. In my former life as a health Minister, I was really interested in what we were doing in life sciences not just to change and improve treatment outcomes and care outcomes for people, but in making sure that people protected their intellectual property. It's one of the risks, actually, for some of the free trade agreements that are being done, to make sure we do have consistent rules that are enforceable in all countries about intellectual property protection as well. And it's certainly something that we do talk to, through our advice services to business and innovators.
And on your point about universities, there's a warning from your local institution about what's happening with the change in funding. Swansea University have been clear that good, high-quality jobs are going because of the change in funding. Now, we've deliberately worked with the university sector. The vice-chancellor of Swansea takes a lead role on some of these areas, on how we're looking to make sure they're alongside us. And part of my challenge to them has been about what universities will do in the future about gaining access to UK funding sources, because, even in the past, before the non-keeping of promises on replacement EU funds, we still wanted our university sector to be better at gaining access to UK funding competition as well. Now there's a real imperative to do so, and that's part of the conversation we've had.
But also, for the higher education sector—further education has a role in innovation as well; I'm not saying it doesn't, but the question was on higher education—part of it is their collective understanding of where they recognise the sector is strong and that there will be different strengths in different institutions, so that we don't have universities competing to knock over each other and say, 'Actually, there are six institutions claiming to be world-leading in the same area in Wales', because we know that's unlikely to be true, but to have a coherent profile from them that will lead into the missions as well, and actually that has informed the areas of strength that we've identified. So, we're in a good place in our relationship with higher education, and I look forward to that being the case through the delivery of this strategy and the delivery plan.