Dundee University head calls Scottish EU membership ‘a must’

The head of Dundee University in Scotland has said that EU membership is “a must” for Scottish universities, regardless of the outcome of the upcoming independence referendum.

In comments carried in The Courier, Professor Pete Downes, principal and Vice-Chancellor of Dundee University, said: “European funding for research, especially now the European Research Council has fully established itself, is immensely valuable to the UK and Scotland. Whatever the outcome of September’s referendum, continuing membership of the EU is a must for Scotland’s universities.”

Dundee University received more than £20m (€24.17m) in European funding during 2012-2013, which came to a sixth of its total research budget. However, Downes also noted that being part of Europe did come with problems.

“A couple of innocent sounding amendments to European laws on data protection, the intentions of which are entirely laudable, have the potential to make illegal the UK’s and especially Scotland’s approach to e-health, using anonymised patient records to greatly improve health outcomes and tailor treatment, and research which makes use of such information. This would be a disaster for Dundee, which has pioneered these approaches.”

Speaking about Horizon 2020, he added: “Horizon 2020 is going to be less bureaucratic than its predecessor and is one of the very few sources of research funding open to us whose budget is increasing – perhaps not as much as had originally been hoped, but an increase nevertheless. There is going to be an even greater emphasis on engaging with industry, especially working with SMEs who will be integral members of research consortia.

“Other European countries have tended to do much better than the UK, and especially Scotland, in getting their own small companies involved, so we will have to work hard on this aspect to ensure the benefits of collaboration are felt in Scotland as much as elsewhere in Europe.”